Neo Alliances
by Achamo
Summary: With mysterious syndicate Nova on the loose, hero-in-the-making Kaita and his Navi, Turboman, must step up to the plate! Together with Mary, Ring, Chisao, and Gutsman, they'll do their best to defend the city. But when the fight goes to the depths of the Ura Net, will Turboman be a help or a hindrance to Roll, resident Net Savior?
1. As They Say About Second Verses

Netto never really noticed the quiet until its repercussions had caught up with him.

It wasn't that he didn't appreciate the lull in action. It meant that plenty of public works officials had been seen around Densan, finally safe to clear away rubble from Cache's rampage (and Grezar's, and the Asteroids', and Laserman's...) which was good. But it also meant that he finally had no excuse keeping him from catching up on schoolwork, which was a bummer.

"I hope you're going to go right back to it after this," Rockman said as Netto stepped on board the subway. There were a lot of businessmen aboard, and they were taking up most of the seats in the first and second cars. As Netto walked past them and through the door to the third, Rockman admonished, "You haven't even touched algebra yet, and there's a test next week!"

Netto rolled his eyes. "Don't hang that stuff over me!" he complained, flopping into the first open seat he could find and crossing his arms. "If Meiru-chan wants to do something else after the arcade, then we will. If she doesn't, then sure, I'll go straight home."

"You mean if _you_ don't want to prolong the trip," laughed Rockman as the subway started on its way.

Netto's long-suffering sigh was cut off by a deafening blast of noise as the car rocked violently, throwing him forward and making the last of his breath catch uncomfortably in his throat. For a moment, he was too dazed to figure out what had happened; it was only a few seconds later that he realized that he'd hit his head hard on the seat in front of him on his trip to the ground.

"Netto-kun!"

But Rockman's shout was nearly completely overtaken by another explosion that threw Netto sideways. He scrambled to his knees-he had to get away, but-

"_Netto-kun!_"

* * *

Class 5-A at Akihara Elementary was generally a well-behaved group of students. There was the occasional note, prank, or mid-class video game, but they mostly kept out of their teacher's hair. So when a black-haired boy burst into the room like the yellow jumpsuit he wore was on fire, everyone stared. From the PET on his wrist came a steady commentary: "There are mere feet between him and the finish line! Ten seconds left on the clock, and-He's done it, folks! In a record four minutes, Todoroki Kaita has made it on time! Any comments from our victor?"

"My siiiiiiiide..." groaned Kaita, as he collapsed into his chair.

"Very fitting after that final dash, folks," commented a younger, brown-haired boy from Kaita's left. "Perfectly sums up how our racing hero feels at this moment." Dressed in her purple and teal dress and boots, Oozono Mariko was a familiar figure to all of the students. As she walked in, she raised her eyebrow at the sight of Kaita slumped over in his seat, his cheek against the desk. Kaita's brunette friend whispered to Turboman, "This has been Oyama Chisao, reporting from the winners' circle."

"Thank you, Chisao," whispered the Navi in response. "Spelling bee coverage up next." To Kaita's surprise, the planned spelling test was not the first thing that Mariko-sensei brought up after roll call. Instead, a blonde-haired girl stood up. She wore purple capris and a light pink shirt that could almost be considered a short dress due to its length. Long, darker pink sleeves poked out of the armholes. Near her chest was a ribbon that hung from what was undoubtedly her family's Navi symbol, a white circle with a diagonal green ring inside.

"Um... Hi. I'm Mary Towa," she began, her green eyes fixed on the ground. Mariko-sensei looked at her, puzzled; Mary caught her glimpse and flushed red. "-I mean, Towa Mary."

"Towa-chan has come here all the way from Kingland with her mother," said Mariko. "She will be in your class for at least this year. Please make sure that she feels at home!"

"We will!" everyone said, and Mary quickly walked back to her seat.

* * *

The uninformed people of the city never let him rest.

Sometimes, he felt it was a wonder he could keep them all under his surveillance. He slowly typed on the keyboard on his lap with one hand and sipped from his wineglass with the other. There were the idiots he sent to distract the Net Police, their movements ultimately pointless and their impatience extremely annoying. There were the Net Police themselves, annoying as ever. If he made it too clear that the preparations for his ultimate move were being made, or that said move could be just months away, the Net Police would come running. If he sent his stronger men to deal with this new attention, he ran the risk of getting them arrested before they'd served their true purpose. So he was stuck with sending the idiots scurrying. They gave him an excuse to order people around, though, and he could never refuse one of those.

He set his wineglass down and began to type with both hands. He knew that it could always be worse. There had been a time when none of this was possible. Now, he could properly _lead_, and be obtuse in a chair to his heart's content. The men who served him now had power, and he had his men. A little wait was nothing.

One of his most trusted men-or women, in this case-walked toward the chair he sat in, her heeled boots clicking on the floor. She couldn't see him, of course. The back of the black chair he sat in was decorated with fiber-optic lights, swirling in rainbow colors around its eight feet of height. He had to be sure that he was careful with his identity this time around, even with someone as loyal as she was. He'd been naive and stupid before, but now, he would finally be able to cause the sort of terror that had seemed out of reach not long ago.

"I've given Nikumu your instruction. She'll be carrying it out at around four 'o clock this afternoon." As if somehow sensing her boss's annoyance at how late that was, she continued, "You can't expect anything more from her. She _is _Nikumu, after all... Be thankful that we're not staying up until three in the morning just to see if she won't screw up."

He sighed, taking another sip. "You're right. Besides, it's not like this is that important. Whatever happens, she's still staying out of my hair..." He smirked. "And, hopefully, confusing the Net Police."

"And out of my hair as well," said the woman with a grin. "I'm going to check on a couple of things that are actually _useful_... Later, Boss."

* * *

The school day progressed much like most others. Unlike all of the other students, who usually contributed something to classes, it was very easy to forget that Mary was even there, sitting by herself in the back row. By the time recess came, she had slipped Kaita's mind entirely; he pulled the portable Netbattle projector he'd been working on from his backpack and his pliers after it. He set the projector down on the benches lined against the building, then sat down next to it, considering which piece would be best to wire up next.

"Anyone want to Netbattle?" asked Chisao from his position next to the water fountain, which had two plug-in ports. "I just got a Navi from my brother yesterday! He's really strong, and I haven't been able to battle with anyone."

"Well, okay," responded one of the girls from class. Kaita watched with interest, since Chisao had been talking about his new Navi for hours on end when they'd last seen each other.

Chisao grinned. "All right! Plug-in, Gutsman! Transmission!" An ape-like Navi flew into the battlefield with a burst of light and began to beat his fists against his red, armor-plated chest.

"You too, Sweetman!" A black-haired Navi dressed in a white jumpsuit that was adorned with fringe, hearts, and an enormous cape flew down with a burst of pink-tinted light. He took out a mirror and comb and checked his pompadour for anything out of place before assuming a ready position.

Gutsman sniggered, "I've more than got you beat in guts, de gutsu!" and beat his chest again.

"Hmph," huffed Sweetman. "See how well you do in a fight before you talk."

Chisao pulled out a battlechip. "Let's see how fast our foe is! Go get him with a Mega Guts Punch!"

"Right!" replied Gutsman. His fist ballooned to three times its size as he charged forward. "Mega Guts Punch!" Sweetman stepped backward, catching his cape with his foot, and fell to the floor, where Gutsman's gigantic fist clobbered him. "Gutsman's the greatest, de gutsu!" said the bulky Navi happily.

"Eeek!" squealed Sweetman's operator. "Get him with this! Ratton!"

"We won't let that hit us!" shouted Chisao. "Cannon, slot-in, and Minibomb, triple slot-in!" A green cannon appeared to Gutsman's left, and it made short work of the mouse-like homing bomb as the red-and-yellow Navi hurled a trio of bombs at Sweetman, who shrieked as he was hit again. "Time to finish this! Battlechip: Mega Guts Punch! Slot in!"

"Raaaaaaah!" yelled Gutsman as he charged toward his ridiculous-looking foe. With one last yell, he drove his massive fist home. Sweetman was sent flying backward, skidding along the ground before logging out.

"Aw, come on!" wailed the girl. "I just can't win at this..."

"Wow!" exclaimed Kaita. "Gutsman's amazing!"

"You bet Gutsman is, de gutsu!" called the Navi from Chisao's PET. "And Gutsman is taking all comers today, de gutsu. There'll be a huge line of people waiting here to get beaten before long, de gutsu!"

Not even a second later, the bell rang. As they gathered their things to return to class, Chisao laughed, "Maybe some other time, Gutsman!"

The rest of the day progressed quietly. Before long, the bell rang for the last time that day, and everyone was released into the streets of Akihara.

Kaita had almost made it out of the gate before Chisao caught up to him. "Want to come over to my place, Kaita-kun?"

"Huh?" Kaita shook his head. "I'm helping my dad out in the garage. Maybe this weekend..."

"He won't mind it if you're a little late, Kaita-kun," Turboman reassured his Operator.

"Hmm..." The black-haired boy thought for a moment, then decided. "Okay, I'll come along."

"Great!" Chisao grinned. "So, do you know what your end-of-year project's going to be on?"

"Aww, don't start on that now..."

* * *

The Oyama house was empty when Chisao let himself and his friend in. Both of his parents were still at work, it seemed. That didn't trouble either of the boys as they made their way through the wide, twisting hallway to the younger of the pair's room. Chisao set his backpack down next to his bed, while Kaita's landed on its side with a thunk near the door.

"I don't really want to do homework yet..." Kaita sighed, with a wistful glance at Chisao's gaming console. It was sitting opposite the bed, which had a thick, knitted, green-and-yellow blanket draped over it. Taking a nap on it was also preferable to homework.

Chisao's eyes followed his friend's before he forced them away. "Me either, but Mama won't be happy if she comes home and I've got nothing done."

Before his friend could reach for his backpack, Kaita desperately searched for something to talk about and hit upon, "Has Akira-kun told you the Netto story yet?"

Chisao seemed to freeze for a second before he asked, "The... Netto story?"

"Yeah! He's telling it to everyone, and he got me twice by mistake-" Kaita stopped. Thinking Chisao's discomfort stemmed from unfamiliarity, he asked, "You've never heard it?"

"Well, I've heard _of _it." Chisao fiddled with a patch of the carpet. "I don't really like ghost stories, especially when-"

Kaita shook his head. "You have to hear it! Ready?"

"Kaita-kun, it's the middle of the afternoon, and..."

"Sssh!" Kaita ran to dim the lights. Chisao sighed as his friend went to adjust the blinds as well. Once that was done, Kaita used the flashlight function on his PET to provide the necessary creepy shadows on his face. "A long, long time ago, before we were even walking or anything, there was this Netbattler called Netto, and his Navi, Rockman. Netto and Rockman were the best Netbattlers _ever_. They fought all sorts of bad guys and other Navis and won every time. Nobody dared set foot in Akihara, 'cause it was Netto's house! ...Or something. That's how Akira-kun does it, but I-"

"They were really good," Turboman cut in before Kaita could get any further off track. "Undefeatable. They say that he's the Rockman that set all of those records down at the arcade-but that's not in the story until later."

"Geez, Turboman, that's the surprise part! You totally ruined it!" Turboman made a face at his Operator, who seized the opportunity to narrate the story again. "So, like he said, they were invincible... or at least, everyone _thought _he was! But just when he'd saved the world for the nineteenth time..."

In the dramatic pause, Gutsman wondered, "I don't remember anything like that, de gutsu. Maybe you're exaggerating a little, de gutsu?"

Kaita rolled his eyes. "It doesn't really matter. Maybe it was just his ninth time. Minako-chan says nineteen." He continued on, "...the subway train he was on _exploded_!"

"_BOOM_!" yelled Turboman, producing a yelp from Chisao.

"That was great!" Kaita said brightly. With relish, he continued, "Anyway, they burned to death, the flesh sizzling on Netto's bones..."

Chisao looked more disgusted than Kaita had been expecting. "That isn't funny," he said. "Hikari Netto was a real person. I used to follow him around town when I was little."

"Wait... really?" Comprehension dawned in Kaita's mind. "Oh my gosh, I didn't mean anything like that..."

"It's okay," Chisao said, a lopsided smile appearing on his face. "I was really young when he died, anyway. For a while, I didn't even understand what had happened."

"Did he really die... like that?" Kaita had never thought much of the story; it was just a ghost story, with no real danger in it at all. But knowing that it was real frightened Kaita somehow, like a safety net had been yanked out from under him. "With the-the burning to death, and everything?"

"Yeah," Chisao said, a bit more melancholy. "My parents almost moved us out of town after that. See, Dekao knew him, too, and-well, anyone could've been in the wrong place, with an incident like that... But like I said, I was really little-I must've been four or five or something," he said with a laugh. "It's still really weird to me, but it's not super-upsetting. I barely even remember it anymore." More quietly, he added after a pause, "He must've saved the whole city tons of times, but I barely even remember him..."

The two friends sat in silence for a while. Chisao seemed to be reflecting on something, but Kaita was incredibly uncomfortable being left with his own thoughts after learning how closely the story paralleled the truth. He felt certain he wasn't going to look at the subway in quite the same way again. "Say, how well did you understand that stuff in Math?" Kaita asked, bringing his friend out of his reverie.

"Huh? Oh, here, I'll show you! It's just a matter of remembering this one thing..."

* * *

A little while later, a black-haired woman wearing an equally dark dress took her place in front of a traffic light. "Connection established, virus programs loaded... Now, here comes my favorite part." The woman laughed, raising her green and purple PET to her computer's port. "Do your thing, Arrow," she said as a red laser transmitted her Navi to the Internet.

* * *

"Bye, Chisao!" yelled Kaita as he left the Oyama family's front yard behind. "Okay, now we really have to get going." They continued on until they reached an intersection, where a huge crowd stopped them. "Aw, man...!" Kaita quickly shoved his way through the many people to where the sidewalk met the road, where a strange sight met his eyes.

"All of the traffic lights are out? But none of the power lines seem to be down... this is really weird." Kaita was pretty certain nobody was sure of what to do. If someone took the initiative and moved at the wrong time, it would result in an accident.

Turboman's voice interrupted Kaita's thoughts. "I just checked, and the Internet connection's still up. We should probably report this to the power plant."

"Sounds good!" Making as dramatic a scene as possible while doing so, Kaita yelled, "Plug-in, Turboman EXE! Transmission!"

"Vrooooom!" Turboman entered the Internet in a burst of crimson light, his visor-covered eyes scanning the infected server. To his surprise, there were viruses of all kinds of elements attacking what looked like large light bulbs. They were the programs in charge of the traffic light's power, and they didn't look like they would hold out for much longer. Turboman was determined to ensure that they wouldn't have to.

"Turbo Wheel!" The wheels on Turboman's shoulders detached themselves and moved down his arms to his hands. The car-like Navi hurled them at his opponents, watching with satisfaction as the tires mowed down most of the viruses.

It was then that things got much worse. From above came a shout of, "You're ruining my fun! Roulette Shaft!" An arrow that flashed in red, green, blue and yellow sped toward Turboman. Kaita was sure they corresponded with the four elements that Navis could possess: Heat, Wood, Aqua, and Elec. The arrow hit its mark; Kaita winced as his Navi's hit points took a slight drop. The projectile's multicolored flashing stopped on red. As Kaita had expected, the arrow and the Navi attached to it burst into flame, causing the hit points of Kaita's Navi partner to go down even more.

Wincing at the damage, Turboman shakily got to his feet. "I think I know where this guy is, Kaita-kun. Send me a Spread Gun, hurry!"

"Got it! Battlechip: Spread Gun! Slot-in!" High above Turboman's head was a quartet of catwalks, forming a square around him. He took aim at the side to his left and fired. Almost instantly, his enemy's cry of pain was heard. A female Navi that resembled a teenage girl fell to the floor, landing with a loud crack; her green eyes flashed with anger as she snatched up the silver bow beside her. Instead of a full helmet, she wore a headband that squashed down some of her short, light green hair. A green dress extended from a silver ring below her purple-clad chest and shoulders, and similar rings on her upper arms hemmed equally green gloves. Above the rings around her ankles was dark coloring like that on her chest area, and below were a pair of green, heeled boots.

"She's a girl? Well... Um... Stop this, or we'll have to hurt you!" exclaimed Kaita, glaring at the Navi from a screen above the fighters' heads.

Turboman sighed, embarrassed by his Operator's naiveté. "You don't really think she'll just give up, do you?"

"Well, it was worth a shot..."

As Turboman had expected, her only reaction to this was to roll her eyes. "Don't rush me, short stuff. It's hazardous to your Navi's health!" She pulled back the string of her bow; a trio of arrows, glowing white with energy, formed on it. "Lightspeed Arrow!" Though Turboman was a relatively fast Navi, he barely managed to leap away in time to let the arrows shoot through empty space instead of his data.

Below Turboman, the green-clad Navi was readying her bow for another shot. Seconds before his Navi's trajectory took him above her, Kaita said, "Let's finish this fast! Battlechip: Minibomb! Double slot-in!" A pair of blue bombs with green stripes around their centers materialized in the red Navi's hands, and he quickly hurled them straight down. The resulting smoke blinded his foe, and he landed without having a shot taken at him. "Flame Tower! Slot-in!"

"Take this! Flame Tower!" yelled Turboman, slamming his fist into the ground. A huge pillar of fire erupted from the spot he'd punched, hurtling toward the green-clad Navi before him. The Minibomb smoke had barely cleared when she found herself staring up at the massive attack.

"We've given the viruses time to do some damage, Arrow!" called a woman's voice. "Retreat!" The green-haired Navi's body morphed into the word ' PLUGOUT' and vanished.

"That sure showed those creeps who's boss!" laughed Turboman. "Let's plug-out!"

* * *

"_Damn it!_" howled the black-clad woman as she stormed into the dilapidated building. "Stupid Arrow, always screwing things up!" She nearly broke the worn-out PET charger when slamming the old Progress PET that she'd never had the money to upgrade from into it. The Navi inside supposed that she should be cowering, but had heard this tirade far too often for it to have much of an effect. Knowing that an excruciatingly long rant was to come, Arrow went into sleep mode, her face disappearing from the screen as the PET shut most of its programs down.

The woman's scowl grew even more pinched as she thought of what her peers and superiors would say. Hands on her hips, she mocked, "Oh, Nikumu, you're such an idiot, even if compared to me you're the next Einstein! Nikumu, why do you screw up more than me? Nikumu this, Nikumu that..." She turned to face the charger in order to give Arrow a look that told her exactly how her Operator felt, but the green-haired Navi had vanished from the screen. "And now my Navi won't even LISTEN to me! I'll get that little brat if it's the last thing I do..."


	2. New Girls in Town!

It was mid-afternoon, and school had just gotten out. "Mum, I'm home!" called Akihara Elementary's newest student. Mary's second day in her new class had gone much like her first. She was a bit lonely, but she supposed it was all right.

"Oh, good!" replied the girl's mother, a beautiful woman who shared her daughter's blonde hair and green eyes. "How was school?" she asked, returning her attention to the sketchbook in her lap.

Though Mary was content, the solitude of her school days didn't sit well with her Net Navi at all. "Horrible!" exclaimed the blonde's partner before Mary plugged into a port on the wall. Moments later, a yellow-clad, lanky Navi with two green pigtails made of rings materialized as a life-sized hologram, free to roam the house. Though Dimensional Areas and Copyroids were now banned due to their constant abuse in the past, this low level of interaction with the real world was not. Having a famous Kinglish fashion designer for a mother certainly had its perks, one of which was access to such expensive technology.

"_Ring!_" scolded Mary.

"Ring-chan!" the Navi corrected, sing-song. "We're in Japan, right? Do as they do, Mary-chan!"

"It was great, Mum!" Mary half-sighed instead. "Things are going just fine." She walked toward the stairs, calling back, "I'm going to get started on my homework, okay? I'll send Ring-chan down if I need anything." The Operator and her Navi walked up the stairs, down the hall, and into Mary's room. There, the girl popped the homework CD into her computer and settled down for an hour of homework.

Mary wasn't even fifteen minutes in before Ring got fed up. "I'm boooored," moaned the Navi from where she was sprawled across Mary's bed. "This stuff is all easy, so you won't need my help. Can I go check out Internet City?"

"If I let you wander off," replied Mary dryly, "you'd come back with some Jawaiian sand thing and tell me that it cost more money than I have, so I'd have to do every job the owner could think of as payback. Again."

"You'll never let me live that one down, will you?" Ring pouted.

Mary laughed, "Never!" and returned to her work.

Ring could see that this wasn't working. It was time for a change of tactics. "But... but, but... it's just not _fair!_" she wailed, giving her surprised Operator the most pitiful doe eyes she could muster. "You can't judge me on that! We were on vacation, and it was so cool! It _is_ so cool-you still have it on your homepage! This is Japan, it's different!"

Mary sighed, knowing that she would end up regretting this later. "I guess you're right. Just... promise me you won't buy anything, okay?"

Ring's demeanor did a one-eighty. "Woohoo! Later, Mary-chan!"

"Plug-in, Ring-chan! Transmission!"

* * *

A burst of yellow light heralded Ring's arrival in her Operator's homepage. After walking around the massive and elaborately decorated sand palace that sat near the back of the page, she ran to the warp to Internet City. When she materialized there, she paused. There were a pair of Navis that looked awfully familiar standing under a large umbrella across the road; she recognized the red one almost instantly. He belonged to one of Mary's classmates, a black-haired boy who seemed like a nice kid. A perfect first friend for Mary, and Ring knew just how to make them meet! Grinning, she waited for the right moment...

* * *

"And then I yelled, 'Flame Tower!', and that Navi ran like a coward, I would've creamed her so badly!"

"Hmmmm... Not bad, de gutsu," said Gutsman, sounding less than impressed. "Still, I would've knocked her away in one shot, de gutsu!"

School had just ended for the day, and Chisao and Kaita were at the local ice cream parlor, letting their Navis chat in Internet City while they did the same in the real world. The brown-haired boy sipped thoughtfully on his mint chocolate chip milkshake after Kaita and his Navi had told him what had happened a day ago at the traffic light. "Arrow, huh? Can't say I've ever heard of her. And speaking of that, attacking a traffic light seems sort of small-scale for a serious band of net criminals. Maybe she and her Operator were working on their own? It'd make much more sense..."

"Yeah, maybe," agreed Kaita, giving his friend's idea some thought of his own. "Or maybe these guys just want to stir up trouble. I don't think there has to be any reason if-ACK! It's melting!" he suddenly shouted, forgetting about the discussion in favor of eating his sundae, which was starting to drip.

Chisao couldn't help but laugh at his friend's frenzied attempts to stop the dripping. "Hurry, or you'll have nothing but a butterscotch puddle!" he chuckled. As Kaita scrambled to get the problem under control, the brunette pulled a small, black object out of his backpack. "Are you free to help me with this on the weekend?"

Licking off a bit of ice cream around his lips, Kaita blinked at it. "A robotic cat?"

"Yep, and this one's remote controlled. My brother's terrified of them. One bit him on the leg when he was in fifth grade. It's a dumb thing to be scared of, I know, but that's just how he is. Dad wanted to get a mouser 'bot, but he's not having any of it. The mice in the basement are driving everyone nuts, so I figured that having one of those cats get attached to him would be perfect! And even if it doesn't work, the look on his face when it's rubbing up to him will be priceless."

"Oh..." The plan seemed fine to Kaita, but the most important question was still unanswered. "Do I get to control it?"

"Of course!" Chisao replied, laughing. "You know I'd just crash it into the wall, and then our cover'd be blown! I'll handle the talking, while our kitty says hello. You've seen that statue of Mahajarama outside Maha Ichiban, right? If you stayed out there, nobody'd notice. Everyone waits for takeout orders there."

Kaita grinned. "All right! What time?"

"Hm..." After a moment's thought, Chisao replied, "How does one o' clock on Sunday sound?"

"That's mean, de gutsu!" protested Gutsman, who'd been listening in through a window hovering over his and Turboman's heads. "Dekao was in the hospital with that thing attached to his leg that whole day, de gutsu!"

The thought of Chisao's huge older brother felled by a tiny cat made both Turboman and Kaita burst into laughter. "You're _kidding!_"

Gutsman gave his friends an annoyed look. "No, I'm not, de gutsu! And it's not funny, ei-"

"_Net Navis of Japan!" _announced a girlish voice over a megaphone, cutting Gutsman off. "_I have come here to issue a challenge to Turboman! If he doesn't accept, I'll destroy this entire city block!"_

"She's challenging us?" wondered Kaita, taking the last bite of his sundae before paying closer attention to his PET. "What for?"

"I bet it's one of Arrow's friends," replied Turboman angrily. "Don't they know when to quit?" Loudly enough to be heard by the Navi, he shouted, "Fine!"

There was a short clicking sound as the megaphone was turned off. Then, a sheet-covered Navi leapt from the roof of a nearby building, landing lightly on her pink-colored feet in front of Turboman. "Good. Leave your friend here and come with me," she demanded, taking off down the main road. Muttering a 'sorry' to Gutsman, Turboman ran after his challenger, following her out of the business district of Internet City and into an upper-class residential one. They got many stares from the personal-use Navis, who probably never saw two strangers tearing down their quiet streets.

"What do you and your Operator want, anyway?" asked Kaita, glaring down at the sheet-covered Navi. "You aren't with Nova, are you?"

The Navi came to an abrupt halt, nearly causing Turboman to crash into her. "Huh? Uh... yeah, sure, I am!" The boy and his Navi exchanged looks as the strange girl took off once more. Shrugging at his Operator, Turboman followed. They didn't have much further to go; the girl took a quick left and vanished into a warp that led to one of the human residents' homepages.

"That's stupid. Going straight to her house's main page is like telling us exactly where to direct the police," noted Chisao as Turboman slowed before walking into the link.

The scene that was unfolding in the Navi's homepage was the last thing that Turboman had expected. "...he's coming to steal all our money and make us do crimes for him!" gasped the Navi girl, who had taken off the sheet to reveal a yellow-and-orange jumpsuit with blue on the edges. She was clenching her pink-mittened hands into fists, and her reddish-pink eyes were staring wide-eyed at her Operator. Two huge pigtails made of rings framed her face.

The girl's Operator, who seemed a little confused, struck Kaita as being a little familiar. She wore her wavy blonde hair with two small braids on either side that tied together in the back, a style that was both cute and practical. "Really?" she asked, skeptical.

"I'm not making this up! Look!" she exclaimed, gesturing to Turboman. "There he is!"

"Me?" asked Turboman in disbelief. "That's rich, coming from the mouth of a Nova member like you!" Kaita attempted to step in and clear a few things up with the two girls himself, but it was no use. Thanks to the page's security preferences (doubtlessly set by the Navi for this scheme of hers), his window was hidden from view. He could still see what was going on, and Turboman could hear him, but the girl and her Navi didn't know he was there.

The Navi girl glared daggers at Turboman before looking back up at her Operator. "And now he's lying, Mary-chan! Let's show him who's boss! After all," she said, turning her attention to her red opponent, "it _was_ a Netbattle he wanted..."

Though her Navi didn't seem to know who Nova was, Mary did. And being accused of commiting crimes on their behalf clearly didn't make her happy at all. Retrieving her Battlechips from someplace offscreen, she said, "Then a Netbattle he'll get. Good luck, Ring-chan!"

"Don't need it, but thanks!" Once that was out of the way, Ring made the opening move. As the ten rings of her pigtails seperated from her head and each other, she yelled, "Eat this, loser! Ring Boomerang!" Turboman was caught off guard-he was hit by two of the rings while attempting to dodge, knocking him to the floor.

"Stay down!" warned Kaita, as his Navi attempted to get up. Turboman heeded his advice just in time for the rings to pass over him on their return trip to Ring's head, where they rearranged themselves into her pigtails once again.

Quickly, Mary called, "Battlechip: Corn Shot! Slot-in!" Ring's right arm morphed into a goofy-faced ear of corn, which opened its mouth to pepper the spot where Turboman lay with some not-so-goofy bullets of rock-hard kernels. The red Navi quickly flipped backwards onto his feet and used his momentum to jump away from the attack, but Ring moved her arm up to hit him.

"Turbo Wheel!" he yelled, hurling his tires straight down his middle. The flaming projectiles burned away the Corn Shot with ease, continuing on to hit Ring squarely in the stomach before she could stop her attack and evade. He landed as the tires rematerialized on his shoulders.

"Ring, are you okay?" Mary asked, alarmed.

The green-ringed Navi gave her Operator a grin and a thumbs-up as she got to her feet. "Ring-_chan_, Mary-chan! I'm just fine. Worry about operating, not me!" Mary gave her Navi a small smile and nod before returning her focus to the fight.

Meanwhile, Kaita had given his Navi a Sword chip. "Ratton, slot-in! Don't throw it until I say the word, Ring-chan!" instructed Mary as Turboman began to close the gap between the two Navis.

"Right!" Ring said confidently, watching as Turboman came nearer and nearer. The red Navi took the opportunity to close the gap, confidence building as he noticed the worry on her face. When he was only ten steps away, she nervously asked, "Now?"

"Not yet," murmured Mary, watching the Netbattle intently. Knowing what the blonde's plan was, Turboman put on some extra speed as he grew closer to throw her off. As he thrust his weapon to the side in preparation to attack inches away, making Ring look more alarmed than ever, the girl yelled, "Now!" Turboman couldn't completely dodge the attack at such a close range; he was clipped by the mouse-like bomb. Even that slight bit of contact was enough to detonate it, sending him crashing onto his knees. His sword was all that prevented him from falling to the ground, nearly cracking under his weight.

Before Ring could attack her foe while he was down, Kaita yelled, "Area Steal, slot-in!" Turboman materialized on the opposite end of the battlefield as Kaita. Determined to finish the fight, he drew out a Battlechip. "All right, time to bring out the big guns!"

"Same here!" retorted Mary, drawing out her most prized Battlechip.

Their Navis grinned. "You," Ring said, pausing to cross her arms smugly, "are _so dead_."

"Likewise," responded Turboman, his sword shifting back into his normal hand.

Kaita slammed his chip home with a cry of, "Flame Tower, slot-in!"

At the same time, Mary called, "Aqua Tower, slot-in!"

Ring and Turboman fired their attacks at each other. They met and canceled each other out, not harming either combatant. Not to be deterred by this, Mary selected two other Battlechips, sending them in and calling, "Area Steal, Wide Sword, slot-in!" Kaita's second Sword chip formed on Turboman's hand just in time; Ring appeared inches from his face and slashed at him horizontally. Their swords met for a moment before the two pulled away. Then, Turboman attempted a strike at Ring's legs. She quickly blocked, her sword pushing down on her enemy's as a smirk slowly crept onto her lips. Before Turboman could ask why, she quickly brought her sword up toward his neck... but before it could reach its destination, he did the same to her!

"Wait a minute, wait a minute!" she yelped, trying to move her neck away from Turboman's sword without pulling her own weapon away from his.

"What?" he asked tersely.

"I... it's just..." Looking away from him with a bit of a pout crossing her features, she blurted, "I'm sorry about lying about being a Nova member, okay?" More slowly, she explained, "I just didn't think you'd come here if I didn't." Ring opened up a text box with her free hand; after adjusting one of the settings, Kaita's window appeared above the battle.

Mary stared at Kaita in surprise-and recognition, while Kaita also realized that she was his new classmate. Then, she shot a stern look at Ring. "Ring-chan, why'd you do that? You should apologize to Todoroki-san and his Navi right now!"

"But, Mary-chan, I already... oh, fine." She let her Wide Sword disappear, her hand falling to her side; Turboman did the same. "I'm sorry, honest! But don't hold this against Mary-chan, all right? It was all me," Ring explained, sounding honestly ashamed. What she said next made Mary horrified all over again. "Anyway, I know we got off to a rocky start, but could you please be her friend? She's always by herself, even at home in Kingland, and I don't want her to be lonely here..."

"W-wait a minute..." stammered Mary, almost looking like the boy and his Navi had already said no. "You can't just _ask _him like that and expect a 'yes'..."

Kaita looked down at Turboman, who shrugged and nodded. Brightly, the boy answered, "Of course we will!"

Ring jumped for joy. "All right!"

Mary smiled as she said, "Thank you so much, Todoroki-san..."

"Just call me Kaita," he corrected her.

Ring grinned. "See, Mary-chan? You had nothing to worry about! I knew this plan would work the entire time!" she said confidently, drawing three quizzical glances from the others.

"No, you didn't!" Turboman said teasingly.

Ring huffed, "Sure I did! I was just hiding how I felt, that's all."

"Uh-_huh..."_

As the Navis' conversation ended, their Operators were saying their goodbyes. "Well," began Mary, "I guess I'll see you tomorrow at school, Kaita-kun!"

Kaita grinned at his new friend as he said, "You too, Mary-chan! Bye!"


	3. Of Bright Lights and Dim Sparks

"Plug-in, Sparkman!" The orange-and-yellow Navi was patterned after one of the Darkloids from years long past. His opponent's Operator had seen a few Navis like that on these recruitment drives; it seemed to be a recent trend among rebellious teenagers. But their skill always paled in comparison to a real Darkloid. They were boring to fight even when he was handicapped. He lifted his PET.

"N-2," he intoned. Sparkman snorted as his opponent arrived-a generic Navi, completely unremarkable and devoid of much intelligence.

"What are you, stupid?" Sparkman's operator asked incredulously, eyebrow raised underneath his blue-and-purple-striped newsboy cap.

N-2's Operator didn't immediately react to the boy's taunt. He'd heard things like it coming from many others like this kid, and he had no need to care; it wasn't like he was doing this for himself. Staying calm while they lost their tempers made his job much easier. "Even the most brainless of us can think," he said calmly.

The black-haired brat frowned, clearly trying to come up with an argument. As the boy kept thinking, the young man opposite him couldn't help drawing the conclusion that he wasn't dealing with an especially clever person. "Gah-uh-_ugh!_ I _meant,_ what's with your Navi?" The kid was staring at him-no, staring at the blue, circular lens that replaced his left eye-with a mixture of fascination and disgust. After so many battles like this, he was getting used to it. Besides, they always showed more respect once he'd given them a reason.

"It's not what you have," he said, cool and collected as ever, "it's what you make of it." The young man smirked. "Shall we begin?"

The words _Battle Start_ flashed across the battlefield, and Sparkman rushed toward his opponent.

"Area Steal!" called the one-eyed Operator, watching with satisfaction as Sparkman tackled air. "Forest Bomb!" Sparkman howled in pain while his Operator glared daggers, raising a Battlechip but never finding an opening to slot it in. It was a ridiculously one-sided strategy. Sparkman couldn't even land an attack before another combination of Area Steal and a Wood-element chip worked their magic.

"Damn it! Stab him or something, Sparkman!" yelled the black-haired Operator. But it was too late; after taking two Forest Bombs and an assortment of other powerful attacks, Sparkman was unable to continue the fight. The brown-haired Operator across from the boy took a breath, then forced out what he'd settled on as his sinister laugh.

"You can call me Black," the darkly-clad man introduced, voice dripping with smug superiority. "You are..."

"Joumon Teruo," scowled the boy, focusing on adjusting one of the white cuffs of his otherwise purple shirt. "What's it to you?"

Black didn't bother answering the question. Instead, he said, "I noticed that you didn't manage to land a single hit. However..." He smirked, more from his own amusement than for Teruo's benefit. "You do want to win, don't you?" he asked, hoping his grin looked genuine. The rest of Nova's upper command had teased him a few times about how his attempts sometimes looked like rictus grins instead of real ones, and it was a little embarrassing to admit he'd lost candidates through it.

"What's it to you?" Teruo repeated impatiently. Judging from how the kid wasn't running, Black had to think that his practicing had finally paid off.

"It means a lot to me and my...friends. You see, we can make your Navi fast enough to catch up to an Area Steal, strong enough to withstand all of those attacks I threw at you and more." Black's grin nearly turned into an honestly amused expression as the greedy smile plastered on Teruo's face grew wider-the poor idiot was falling for it in record time. "I see that you're interested. Well, then, my friends will show you the way, but you'll have to promise them and me a thing or two."

"Anything!" yelled Teruo.

"Promise me," Black began, gradually replacing his grin with a serious expression, "that you will do anything and everything that my friends and I tell you to do. Even if it means breaking the law."

"Of course!"

"Promise that you will never tell anyone about what we show you-no matter how much it disgusts you, unnerves you, anything."

"All right!"

Black took his companion by the shoulder and began to steer him toward the door; Teruo was going to make good fodder for the Boss. "Last but not least, you must never question my or anyone else in this organization's authority. We are above any other person in respect to you now. Got it?" Teruo nodded. Black plastered another grin on his face. "Then I believe that you're more than ready for our secrets! But before we do anything, my friends and I would like to see you in battle. I know just the person for you to fight..."

* * *

Kaita strolled into his classroom, sitting down at his desk and plugging Turboman into the computer. After yesterday's events, he wasn't surprised when Mary walked up to his desk and said hello. They were able to talk for a little while before the bell rang, prompting the blonde to return to her seat.

Mariko-sensei appeared soon afterward. After setting her bag down on her desk, she cheerfully greeted, "Good morning, everyone!" As the class chorused their hellos, their teacher made the usual rounds of the classroom, picking up a CD at every desk. It was only then that Kaita realized something terrible: _he hadn't done his_-

"Homework, please," Mariko-sensei said cheerfully, stopping in front of her doomed student's desk. He searched everywhere he could, but it was simply impossible to track down something he didn't have.

"Um... uh... stuff happened, and, uh, Ididn'tdomyhomework-" He gave her a small smile. "Um... don't kill me?"

It was like a switch had been flipped. Gone was the cheerful Mariko-sensei; instead, a stern and serious schoolteacher loomed over Kaita's desk. He found himself wishing he'd skipped the stop at the ice cream parlor-maybe then he would've gotten some work done... "You _didn't_."

Suddenly, Kaita found the top of his desk incredibly interesting. "Um... I'm really sorry..."

"See me after school" was her only reply as she turned and continued on to collect the other students' homework CDs.

"Detention..." commented Turboman from the safety of his PET. "Ouch."

Kaita shot him a dour look as he pointed out, "Says the Navi that's supposed to remind me about this stuff."

"Hey, it wasn't my fault!" Turboman protested. "We had an eventful afternoon! How was I supposed to remember something like homework after everything that happened?"

"If you're trying to spread the blame to Mary-chan and Ring, I'm not buying it-"

"_Boys._" After making sure that Kaita and Turboman had caught the glare she shot in their direction, Mariko-sensei returned to the front of the classroom. "Now, let's turn our attention to world history, shall we? The nineteenth century was one of great changes, both here and abroad..."

* * *

As the bell rang for lunchtime, the students in Class 5-1 leapt out of their seats and burst into chatter as those who had them grabbed their lunches and joined the crowd headed to the cafeteria. Kaita remained silent; Chisao turned to ask him, "Kaita, are you going to sit there all day?"

"I just want to get something out of my desk," Kaita explained. "You can go ahead-I'll be right there in just a moment, okay?"

"Well, if you really want to..." said Chisao, eying the homework CD in his friend's hand. "Don't spend all of recess doing homework, though. From what I've heard, Mariko-sensei won't let you go just because you've caught up." He turned to Mary, telling her, "Come on, let's find a good seat!"

"Well, if it's really okay... all right!" With that, the two grabbed their things and left Kaita and Turboman alone in the classroom.

However, they weren't alone for long. Moments after Chisao and Mary had left, the distinctive sound of a Navi entering the area reached Turboman's sound receptors. He whirled around. "What makes you think you can just drive in here?" he asked sharply as he spotted the noise's source: a heavyset Navi, his cloak obscuring his features.

"I'm here to challenge you to a Netbattle," responded the cloaked Navi, his sneer evident in his voice. "There's a power plant on the outskirts of Densan City. It's been abandoned for years, so it's perfect for our match," he explained as map data with directions to the plant materialized before him. "My Operator'll be waiting there at three-fifty... and if you don't show, I know a few people who can make life very, very miserable for you."

Realizing the problem with this already, Kaita tried to explain, "But-"

"No buts," the Navi said coldly. "Be there." Before Turboman could protest, his challenger plugged out.

Kaita plugged Turboman out of the the desk, got up, and ran for the door. "Let's tell Chisao-kun and Mary-chan about this," he said, taking his lunch and heading out. "They might have a better idea of what to do. Maybe one of them can go talk to this guy about finding some other time to do this."

"But... homework?" Kaita wasn't paying attention at all. Turboman shrugged and said, "Never mind."

Chisao and Mary were already halfway finished with lunch by the time Kaita got there. As he shoveled down his food to catch up, Ring asked, "Were you stuck on something, or did you blow it off? That didn't take long at all."

"Shume gui harched..." began Kaita, his friends giving him confused-and in the case of Mary, slightly disgusted-looks. After swallowing the food in his mouth, he explained, "Some guy barged into my desk and challenged me and Turboman to a Netbattle after school, and I don't know what to do."

"Say no," Chisao said immediately.

Kaita sighed, giving his friend an annoyed look. "If he had let me, do you think I'd have this problem?" He explained, "He said something like, 'come or I'll make your life miserable...' and you know I can't make it today. Could you guys please go and talk things out with that guy?" Mary looked uncertain and Chisao clearly didn't like the thought of playing the middleman. Desperately, Kaita added, "Please?"

Chisao began, "I don't think-"

"Pleeease?"

"Kaita," explained Chisao, "we've got stuff to do after school, too."

Ring countered, "Actually, Mary-chan's whole afternoon is free!"

"I don't think that's Chisao-kun's point, Ring-chan..."

Kaita sighed. His hopeful look in Chisao's direction was met by stern disapproval. "I know it's my problem and all, but... come on, guys..."

"He doesn't have any other choice, Mary-chan," said Ring, her mind clearly made up. "Can we? It's not like we'll get into that much trouble..."

Mary sighed, "Well..."

"Pleeeease..."

"Oh, all right. If there really isn't any other choice..." Reluctantly, Mary asked, "Where is it?"

"It's at an old power plant that's about half a mile into the outskirts of town," explained Turboman, sending the directions floating toward Ring with a light push of his hand.

"That place?" asked Chisao as he looked at the map, surprised. "There was a big scandal concerning it four years ago. They had to shut it down after the Net Saviors found out the heads of the plant were conducting illegal experiments with some kind of device, I think..." He frowned. "There might still be something dangerous in there. I should go with you, just in case things take a turn for the worse."

"Thanks, guys!" said Kaita gratefully.

"I'm not doing it because _you_ asked, it's because Mary-chan here needs company!" said Chisao, halfway teasing. The bell rang, prompting the three to join their fellow students in returning to class.

* * *

After school had ended, Chisao and Mary bade their poor friend farewell, stifling giggles at the miserable look on his face, and caught a bus that would take them closer to the old power plant. Though the bus did take them further than the subway would've, there was still at least a quarter of a mile to go before they reached their destination. It was a long way to walk, but Mary could see the evidence of the old experiments Chisao had mentioned almost instantly. Unnatural cracks and holes in the pavement began to appear as they grew closer, and dilapidated buildings that were often nothing more than rubble flanked the streets. The children had to step carefully, as glass was sprayed everywhere. It was clear to see where it had all come from; none of the windows had retained their panes.

"Creepy..." said Mary to herself. They were staring up at the plant; despite the ruin surrounding it, it was perfectly fine.

Chisao took a deep breath, then said, "Well, let's go." His friend nodded in agreement, and the two headed toward the abandoned building, Mary unintentionally putting a bit of distance between herself and her companion. They didn't expect anything to happen, and Mary was about to open the door when two simultaneous clicks stopped her. Crackling noises began to sound from behind her, and she turned to find Chisao blocked off by a literally electric fence. It skipped the wire entirely in favor of a wall of blindingly white electricity. It kept the two inches apart, but far away from the other's assistance.

The first thing that occurred to both of them was to search for a plug-in port for the fence. Mary didn't spend long looking before Chisao said, "We shouldn't keep whoever's in there waiting. Go ahead of me, and I'll see if I can get in. But until then, be careful, okay? Good luck!"

Mary replied, "Don't worry, I will. Thank you!" She nervously turned to face the doors; now that Gutsman and his Operator weren't there to help if things went wrong, her confidence had diminished greatly.

Noticing her Operator's nervousness, Ring said, "Hey, relax. We'll be fine-between my skills and your smarts, we've got those jokers licked!" She gave Mary a thumbs-up and a smile. After returning the favor, Mary hesitantly stepped inside.

The first thing that she saw upon entering the power plant was a lanky teenager dressed in teal pants and a purple shirt. He probably wasn't more than a few years older than her, but it was hard to tell-his pink sunglasses and blue-and-purple hat obscured his face, throwing her off. "Hey, you're not a boy!" he realized obnoxiously, pointing a slightly bony finger at her.

"Kaita-kun can't come," explained Mary, bristling at bit at her opponent's rudeness. "He has detention, so-"

"-I'll have to fight you. I get it already," interrupted the black-haired boy sourly, crossing his arms. "But I'm supposed to fight Turboman, so you'd better get me Turboman _right now_ or I'll-"

"It's fine, Teruo," explained a voice from the boy's PET. It sounded like a man whose patience was still required of him despite it having been worn thin, so his voice was settling at an odd cross between a calm tone of voice and a groan.

"You!" exclaimed Teruo, glaring down at the small screen. "How the hell'd you get in my PET?"

Dryly, the voice replied, "Magic. That girl's a friend of Turboman's Operator. Probably at about the same skill level as him, so you shouldn't have a problem... _if_ you're as good as you say you are. Happy battling..." Though Mary couldn't see what was happening, the frustrated look on Teruo's face showed that his helper had hung up.

"Well, you heard him," said Teruo, aiming his PET at a large computer in the back of the room. "Sparkman, trash her Navi!"

Mary gave him a frown in response before calling, "Plug-in, Ring-chan! Transmission!"

"Ring is in the-WAAH!" She barely managed to dodge a thin bolt of lightning, fired from above her by a Navi that was large, yellow, and clearly of the Elec element; the two spikes on either end of his cylindrical forearms crackled with electricity, and his body resembled an orange-and-yellow spark plug. From the view that the PET gave her, Mary noticed that he stood on the lowest of many gray, floating platforms that filled the air above the faintly glowing main floor of the area. "It's common courtesy to give some warning before you start, y'know!" yelled his annoyed target.

The oversized spark plug snorted. "I'm sorry, I've never heard that one. And even if I had, I doubt I'd care," he sneered. "Spark Ball!" An orange ball with circular, yellow spikes protruding from it materialized before Sparkman before flying toward Ring. The yellow-clad Navi ducked under it as it whizzed by, but that wasn't enough to avoid the next attack-electricity surged from the projectile, giving Ring a shock for her unpreparedness. As she recovered, Sparkman moved in for the next blow. "Spark Arm!" he yelled, jabbing the two spikes on the ends of his arms at her. This attack was far more straightforward, and Ring weaved out of his reach with ease.

As Sparkman pulled back both arms to attempt another strike, Ring made her move. "Ring Boomerang!" This time, it was Sparkman's turn to be caught off guard as the ten rings pelted him relentlessly and sent him reeling backward. Before he could hit the ground, though, the swarm of rings smashed into him on their return trip, causing him to fall on his face instead.

Teruo glared down at his PET screen. "Get her, Sparkman! Minibomb, slot-in!" Though the Minibomb itself was easy to avoid, the smoke was not. Neither was Sparkman's follow-up barrage of Spark Arm attacks; the yellow-clad Navi ducked and weaved as well as she could, almost completely unable to see her opponent in the smoke. Her attacker soon tired of this tactic, however, and sent a Spark Ball flying into Ring's back. As she pitched forward, Sparkman struck her hard with his right spike before backing away.

"Ring!" gasped Mary as her Navi stumbled backward from the blow, stopping in a crouched position.

"Don't worry... I'll be fine," the Navi said, quickly leaping from her spot as Sparkman fired a Cannon at her. She landed on the second-lowest platform, looked up to see the hundreds more that dotted the air above her, and grinned. "As a matter of fact, I think I've got a plan." She made it to platform twelve in two large jumps, hoping that the effort she made to get there wasn't too obvious to her enemy, before turning to address him. "Hey, Sparkman! Was your programmer colorblind? I mean, that yellow-and-orange thing you've got going on there is so garish!" she taunted. Mary found it a bit amusing-Ring's outfit was even brighter than his. "And, seriously, what's with the bulkiness? I could understand it if your Operator was fat and needed moral support, but he's a twig! I think you need to go on a diet..."

Sparkman's taunter may have been mostly yellow, but all he saw was red as he howled, _"You little-"_

"Dash Condor, slot-in!" called Mary over her opponent's last word, realizing what Ring's strategy was.

"Thanks for the lift, Mary-chan!" said Ring with a grin, hopping onto the green virus below her.

"Shoot her down, Sparkman!" called Teruo, also smarting from Ring's taunts. "Vulcan, slot-in!" The yellow-clad girl leapt from her Kiorushin just in time; any later, and she would've been caught in the blast as her ride took the hits and exploded. "Oh, no you don't... Cannon, slot-in!" Unprepared to dodge another attack, Ring flew forward as the blast slammed into her back. The only thing that saved her from falling back to ground level was her last-minute grab for the platform's edge. "Go get her, Sparkman!" called Teruo. After hearing this, Ring allowed herself a small grin as she pulled herself back onto the floating floor and put some more distance between herself and her opponent.

Unfortunately for Sparkman, Ring wasn't even close to running out of platforms, and she was right on one thing-his weight made her lighter on her feet than he was. That meant that while she was still full of energy after making the leaps to the higher levels, her pursuer was getting tired and frustrated after forcing his legs to do so many jumps. Ring smiled brightly down at him as he came closer to her, landing with loud thuds every time he came down and muttering curses under his breath as he made his ascent. Looking up to notice her only made him angrier; he shot a Spark Ball at her, but she calmly sidestepped it. Growling, he continued on. As he went for the final jump, Ring's grin grew brighter as her pigtails separated into attack formation. "Ring Boomerang!" she called, unable to keep the laughter out of her voice. Sparkman was swatted out of the sky, plummeting all the way down to the ground thirty-five floors below. Dazed from the fall, he could only lie there and groan as Ring hopped down from platform to platform before reaching the ground.

"Now for the finishing touch! Battlechip: Aqua Tower, slot-in!" called Mary confidently.

"Get ready to lose! Aqua Tower!" The moment the pillar of water touched him, Sparkman disappeared from the battlefield in a log-out.

Teruo glared at Mary, paying little attention to Sparkman. "I'll get you for this!" he yelled before fleeing the scene.

"I'd like to see you try!" Ring yelled back. "Great job, Mary-chan!" she congratulated her Operator.

"I wouldn't have won if if hadn't been for you," responded the girl modestly. "Now then... that fence should be gone, so let's go find Chisao-kun!"

* * *

"Wow," said the brown-haired woman, peeking over Black's shoulder at a screen showing the Netbattle's results. "The last time I saw someone go down that fast to a Navi that girly was when Fitzy tried robbing that chip shop."

He looked up at her, confused. "Which one was Fitzy again?"

"Ameroupian guy, blue eyes, blonde hair..." Black shook his head and shrugged. "Divorced his rich wife and didn't get enough money, had that Navi that looked like something out of Tuesday Night Throwdown? I beat him with Violet, and he wouldn't talk to me for days?" Violet was a purple-and-white Navi that was mostly uncustomized and often loaned to members who'd gotten in on some skill other than Netbattling-at the moment, only Black. The gray-eyed woman couldn't claim the same thing, as she did have a Navi of her own. However, that Navi was off scouting for Black and couldn't serve her Operator at the moment.

"Oh! Fitzgerald the Forty-Millionth! Yes, that was pretty good," Black agreed, closing the window displaying the fight after Ring was plugged out. "But when Shuuko knocked him out with a chip carrier, that's what elevated it to perfect." He smirked at the memory, commenting, "I see the resemblance between those two, now that you say it."

"Yeah. Same flavor of stupidity," his peer said, an equally nasty grin on her face. "Anyway, the Boss wants us. Hopefully not for any more mingling with the cannon fodder, but I'm not keeping my fingers crossed."

"Oh, I don't know about that," Black said. "He's got at least one thing he needs done, and you know he likes his timing to be just so..."

"Well, whatever it is, it's not getting finished by us sitting here and babbling. Come on, let's go." With that, she left the room, leaving Black to close his laptop and follow her.


	4. The Telephone Hour

Hitomi sighed, clutching her hands happily to her chest. It had only been two minutes since her boyfriend called to ask her out on an official, honest-to-goodness date, and her heart was still racing. She and Satoshi had been doing little things like getting ice cream and going to the arcade together for what seemed like an eternity. But here it was. Her almost frustratingly timid boyfriend, the man who almost seemed to fear the idea of taking that important step, had asked her out to dinner at the most romantic waterfront restaurant in Densan City. It almost seemed too good to be true, what with his personality. She almost expected him to call at that moment to try talking her out of it...

The phone rang, snapping her out of her thoughts. "Darn it, here comes the bad news," she muttered. She picked it up, opened her mouth to say something... and froze, forgetting to close her mouth as the words reached her ears.

"A movie? At six? Oh, I thought you'd never ask!"

"Have a bit more faith in me, sweetie. We've only been going out for a couple of months..."

Hitomi was livid. Who was this 'sweetie', and what in the world was he doing talking to her? Her voice betrayed her; try as she might, she couldn't voice her anger, only the hurt and confusion.

"Who is she?"

Satoshi sounded just as shocked as she was-for a very different reason. "I-I can explain-"

"EXPLAIN?" The other woman was furious enough for both of Satoshi's love interests. "Just _what_ is this?"

Nervously, Satoshi stammered, "This-this'll make sense... eventually..."

But neither girl was interested in hearing his explanations; every bit of their fury was focused on him, and they wasted no time unleashing it.

* * *

In the telephone lines, Arrow removed her hands from the large digital switchboard before her and smirked. "Well, I think I did those girls a big favor," she said to herself. Placing her green-gloved fingers lightly on the interface before her once again, she frowned, perusing the calls being made. "Sleepover... eh, she's inviting every girl in her class. No... not bad enough... come on, Densan, give me your worst..." The archer was about to consider giving up on her pranks when a conversation caught her interest. Smirking, she made the proper changes, and the fun began anew.

* * *

Sweetman's Operator hummed to herself as she walked into class. She barely even gave Kaita a second glance until he stood up and walked over to her. "What was that for?" he asked angrily, a slight pout on his face.

Innocently, she asked, "What was what for?"

"That call! You said I was annoying!" Kaita complained.

The girl blinked, frowning. "The one I made last night? You weren't there for that," she said. "But now that it's out in the open, yeah, sometimes you can be kinda annoying."

"What? I am _not_ annoying!" Kaita whined. "You should say you're sorry!"

She sighed. "Okay, okay, I'm sorry for saying that behind your back. Are you happy now?" Before Kaita could say anything, Chisao came up to the girl as well.

"At least call people 'wacko nerds' to their faces!" Chisao exclaimed. Kaita blinked at him, surprised-he hadn't stuck around for that one. Looking around the room, he noticed that almost everyone was having similarly angry conversations save for Mary, who was staring at the chaos with surprise.

"Hi, Kaita-kun," she greeted him as he walked over to her desk.

Curious, Kaita asked, "You didn't get a phone call, Mary-chan?"

"Well, I got one that said I was too shy," Mary recalled, "but Ring-chan tells me that all the time anyway, so it wasn't that bad. How about you?"

"I think that everyone got one, actually," Kaita noticed. "Except her, and that's because she was the one making most of them." A small mob had formed around Sweetman's Operator, which Chisao soon got away from to join them.

"Who did this?" wondered Mary, watching as the mob grew to make up over half the class.

"Whoever it was, they had cell phones in the Internet, de gutsu," Gutsman piped in. "I got a call, too."

Ring gave him a skeptical look as Turboman asked, "You got an actual call from someone? Like people do? That's weird."

"I know," Gutsman replied. "It was the strangest thing, de gutsu..."

* * *

_Gutsman was innocently organizing Chisao's planner, not aware that he was putting the current week's events into the week after, when a persistent ringing sound interrupted him. He turned to see a blue-and-silver cell phone floating at eye level. After wondering how it had gotten there-after all, phones of any kind weren't usually seen in the Internet-Gutsman shrugged his massive shoulders and snatched it from the air. After a few tries, he managed to flip it open. Nearly crushing the little device in his massive grip as he smashed it against his jaw, he yelled, "HELLO?" _

_"I can hear you just fine," said a derisive voice from the other end, prompting Gutsman to shove the phone towards his ear. If he had actually made it into the old power plant, he would've found the voice familiar-this young man had made a call to Teruo just before Mary had humiliated him. "Congratulations on screwing up yesterday."_

_"Hey!" Gutsman yelled indignantly. "What're you talking about, de gutsu?"_

_It was almost possible to hear the caller rolling his eyes. "Your wonderful job getting rid of that fence. You couldn't get past the power plant's security because you destroyed the key in your show of how fast you could wipe out a few worthless viruses."_

_Gutsman was clueless, wondering aloud, "There was a key, de gutsu?"_

_"Yes, the Metool with the orange helmet had it, and you ripped both to shreds with your Guts Machine Gun," he said brightly. "Lot of help you were to that poor girl. Now, if you'll excuse me, I can feel my IQ dropping with every minute I spend in contact with you. Goodbye." With that, the cell phone wrenched itself out of Gutsman's hands, closed itself with a satisfying clap, and began to float away._

_"GET BACK HERE!" shouted Gutsman, running after the blue-and-silver phone with all the speed he could muster, his heavy feet pounding the floor. It was no use; the little phone stopped, as if to taunt its pursuer, then floated straight through the wall, leaving Gutsman to smack into it._

* * *

"...and I didn't even know the guy, de gutsu!" exclaimed Gutsman after his retelling of the event (which excluded the whole bit about the key, because that was_ not true, thank you very much_), prompting quizzical looks from his friends.

"What's the big deal?" Turboman asked. "If all he did was call you a moron and hang up, it's not really that horrible. Now, if the phone had started shooting laser beams, then I might understand..." For the sake of his reputation, Gutsman remained silent as Mariko-sensei walked into the classroom.

"Good morning, everyone... yes, Emiko?" asked the brown-haired woman, turning her attention to the girl who'd raised her hand.

The girl couldn't help but wonder, "Did you get one of those bad phone calls?"

Her teacher thought over it, then shook her head. "I didn't, but a few of the other teachers did... how many of you have gotten these calls?"

"Nearly everyone in the class got one, Mariko-sensei!" exclaimed Kaita.

"Well, I think that we should all watch what we say on the phone tonight. These people might even be teaching us a lesson-none of you should be saying rude things behind your classmates' backs. Now then, let's start class..."

* * *

Nikumu was adding some more gel to the tips of her pointed pigtails when a message box appeared on her nearby computer. After taking her time to finish her touch-up, she pushed her chair to her desk and looked at the message. "What is it now, Arrow?"

"My apologies for bothering you, Nikumu-sama, but..." Arrow decided to use as few words as possible; her Operator was already giving her an unappreciative look. "I seem to be running dry on ammo."

"Oh, come on, you can't be... huh." She gave Arrow's proffered text window a pensive frown. "So, the people of Densan are minding their manners. Well, I think I have an idea. Arrow, access call history and start recording," she commanded, grinning as the idea took shape in her mind. "If we can't get the real thing, we'll just have to make our own!"

* * *

The next day, a Navi wearing a jacket and tie entered the Todoroki family's homepage. Turboman was there to meet it, though Kaita was still asleep. "Turboman, right? I have an e-mail for your Operator's parents," he said, a text box materializing before the red Navi. "Now, if you'll excuse me..."

It didn't take long to find out what the news was. Someone impersonating the principal had angered the teachers, and they were banding together to go on strike. Supposedly impersonating, at least-the principal claimed to have never made any such calls, but the teachers knew his voice. As he finished looking it over, Turboman sighed, "Why am I not surprised..." Last night had been one filled with bad blood for the whole area. Three calls into the evening, Kaita's father had disconnected the phone and switched the cell phone features in the household's PETs off. Nobody stopped him. Even Densan News Network had been getting angry calls from annoyed viewers who hated the reporters for doing their jobs, going on to wonder why 'nobody could present the news _correctly_ these days.' Turboman couldn't believe that the city had become so angry so fast... but what could he do?

A sound from behind him alerted the red Navi to the presence of an unexpected guest, and he turned to find Ring standing behind him. "G'morning, Turboman," she greeted, looking around the Todoroki homepage with interest and lingering on the nearby link to Kaita's in-room computer. "Is Kaita awake yet?"

"I don't think so," responded Turboman.

"Okay," she said innocently. With that, she yanked both into the link. "WAKE UP, KAITA!" Ring hollered, ignoring Turboman's horrified expression.

In response, a high-pitched scream followed from outside the computer, followed by a dull thump. "Turboman, did you have to-_Ring_?" Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Kaita yawned, "Wha's going on?"

"I'm gonna go get Gutsman, and then we're all going to Mary-chan's homepage," Ring informed the two. "We need to talk-and_ not_ over the phone."

* * *

After the group finished greeting each other and reassuring irked friends that no, they hadn't called anyone a 'waste of space', Mary got down to business. "Well... I'm sure you've figured this out already, but the easiest way to distribute these fake calls is through the phone network." Chisao nodded his agreement, while Gutsman, Kaita, and Turboman just looked confused.

"You think these calls are all fake?" Turboman wondered.

"Well, is it really that believeable for the whole town to suddenly turn on one another just like that?" asked Chisao.

"No, de gutsu," replied Gutsman, "but the voices sound so real! How can you tell what's real and what's fake, de gutsu?"

Mary explained, "We only got one call directed toward Mum at my house-it was a complete stranger, too. He said we should just move back to Kingland, because Mum's programming skills would be laughed at if she found work at the Ministry of Science." Cheerfully, she continued, "He was right-Mum doesn't know a thing about programming because her work has nothing to do with it!"

"Mum's barely left the house at all, actually," Ring continued. "Between unpacking and that special wedding dress she's finishing this week, I'd almost say she's being as anti-social as you, Mary-chan!" Before her Operator could comment on that, Ring continued, "Anyway, the point's that we don't even know anyone who'd say that, nevermind that it doesn't make any sense."

"I did a little searching around the Internet, and making these fake calls straight from the source-the call data in the phone company's main servers-would be the easiest way for these things to spread around in such large numbers. There's probably a Net Navi in there causing this, so all we have to do is plug in and beat him," Chisao finished.

"Into the servers? No offense, but they won't let a bunch of kids like you guys even _see_ the servers, much less use them," Turboman pointed out.

"Not a problem," Chisao said. "You've got cable, right, Kaita?"

"Of course," Kaita replied.

Chisao continued, "That uses the phone lines, so we'll just go to our backyards and plug in there. Our Navis'll eventually meet up, and then we'll head for the network's central area."

Kaita couldn't help but notice, "But that's the same as using the servers! Won't we get in trouble?"

To that, Ring's only replies were a shrug and an unconcerned, "Eh, what the Net Police doesn't know won't hurt them. Come on, guys, let's get going!"

* * *

Turboman had been expecting more out of the phone lines' network than a long, dim, and sparsely decorated corridor. "Boring," he commented to himself as he started walking. Moments later, he discovered what was so special about it when the next hallway ended in a fork.

"It's a maze," realized Kaita, observing the sight through his PET screen. "I guess it makes sense, since phone lines're all over the streets..."

"I bet that's got a lot to do with it. I'll try going in the direction of Chisao's house-maybe I'll meet up with Gutsman," decided Turboman, taking the right fork. Two more forks and a dead end later (which, Turboman discovered, led to someone's home phones-prank calling through this network was ridiculously easy, it seemed), Turboman was at the blue, shimmering wall that would, in theory, trigger a call to Chisao's house. Gutsman was nowhere in sight. "He probably hasn't gone far," commented the red Navi. "I guess I'll just keep going."

As he continued on, he noticed that the sparseness that he'd started in was beginning to be accented by a red wire that ran across the left wall, shading the corridor a deep crimson. Turboman hoped that it was a sign that he was getting closer to the main computer, since this was starting to get more than a little boring. Before he could complain, the sounds of a fight began to issue from somewhere to his left. "That isn't..." Turboman muttered as he heard a distinctive yell, speeding up to reach the clamor's source. Sure enough, Gutsman had found trouble already; he was attempting to knock away a strange-looking virus that was screaming insults into the air. Before Turboman could help, Gutsman deleted it with a Mega Guts Punch.

"Well, I think the bad guys know about us now," remarked Ring as she strolled toward the other two. "Really, I could hear you two having it out from miles away!" Over their protests, she continued, "Well, we can't help that now. Let's get going!"

The areas of one red wire gradually became fewer; now, the maze's walkways were tinted a pleasant lavender by the red wires and new, blue-colored wires that traveled along the right wall. Despite this slight change, the three were bored enough by the monotony to barely bat an eye as they emerged in a central room, the red, green, and blue wires crisscrossing on the ceiling above them shining nearly white light down. What was in the room garnered a bit more attention.

"Aren't those telephones?" asked Turboman, pointing out a pair of cylindrical objects with tops that closely resembled bicycle horns and a detachable earpiece, also horn-shaped, sitting in a holder next to each one.

Gutsman frowned. "I've never seen ones like those, de gutsu..."

"That's because those're the really, really old kind," said Ring, walking up to them. "I saw them on TV once."

Suspiciously, Gutsman said, "If they're phones, maybe they were put here by the same guy that called me, de gutsu..."

Suddenly, the phone next to Ring began to ring. Before anyone could stop her, she picked it up and informed her caller, "Densan City Morgue-you kill 'em, we chill 'em!"

Mary exclaimed, "_Ring!_"

"I had to do it!" the yellow-clad girl defended. "It's not every day that you get a chance like this. And, besides, I don't think this guy's hung up yet... huh?"

Mary blinked at her Navi, who was now uncharacteristically silent and focused. "What is it?"

"Ssh," hushed Ring, listening intently. "It sounds like there's some kind of fight... there's cannons and stuff... and some pirate-ish guy's saying, 'Hard to starboard'."

"And then what?" asked Kaita.

"It just loops. Over and over again, 'hard to starboard'." Ring shrugged and hung up. "Maybe it's some sort of hint to which way we should go," she said, gesturing at the many paths that led out of the room.

"If it's a hint, then you guys should go left," Chisao said. "Or is 'starboard' right?"

From Ring's muttered musings and Gutsman's confused expression, Turboman was pretty sure that the Navis knew as much as their Operators did about naval terms. "We're clueless, too... and I don't think we can look it up on a website if we don't want to start over."

Getting up from the lawn chair that he'd set in the backyard, Kaita decided, "I'll find out, okay? Just wait there for a second-I'll be right back!"

"Good luck!" As Kaita left to begin his search for a dictionary, Ring began, "So, since we're stopped here, does anybody want to tell..."

The faint sound of tramping feet began to sound from all around them, accompanied by a soft, "Met! Met!"

"...ghost stories?" The yellow-clad Navi turned to find a swarm of Metools pouring out from the doorways, pickaxes at the ready. "Oh, boy. Ring Boomerang!"

"Turbo Wheel!" As the tires shot into the crowd, taking down the viruses in their path, their owner cringed-the Metools were coming in at a steady pace, filling the empty floor left behind by the trio's attacks easily.

"There're too many, de gutsu!" shouted Gutsman over the fight, punching away viruses left and right.

Turboman kicked away a stray virus that was at his feet before aiming another Turbo Wheel attack into one of the doorways. The stream of Metools stopped from that direction, but that wasn't much relief. "No kidding!"

Noticing Turboman's tactic, Mary said, "Aim for the doorways, Ring-chan! Battlechip: Aqua Tower!"

"Got it! Aqua Tower!" The wall of water was even more effective, wiping out about a third of the Metool mob and flooding a few of the entrances. Ring turned to knock down a few of the yellow-helmeted viruses with a well-placed Ring Boomerang, saving Turboman from getting pounced on by the little viruses. "Geez, Turboman, when's Kaita gonna get here?"

"Soon, hopefully!" he replied, sending another attack on its way. "I don't know what's taking him so long!"

Kaita, carrying a bag of potato chips, reappeared on the scene. "Starboard's right-whoa, what happened!"

"You _ate lunch_?" asked Turboman, giving the chip bag a disbelieving look.

Kaita slotted in his Flame Tower Battlechip, taking down the opposition lying due right and giving the group a chance to run for the rightmost exit. Flustered, he explained, "It's just a snack! I didn't know this would happen!"

The corridor was surprisingly short, painfully so when the group discovered that it ended in yet another telephone room. Ring ran for the phone while her friends turned around to face the doubtlessly pursuing mob. "Opposite of the entrance... three to the right, one to the left, two to the right... there!" she yelled, pointing at the correct door.

"Battlechip: Kouri Hougan, slot-in!" called Kaita as his Navi cleared away some of the approaching swarm. Turboman's next move was to throw the icy bomb at the doorway, where it froze the opening-and the viruses' path to them-shut. "That should be the end of that problem," he said with a grin.

"What a relief," sighed Mary as the Navis moved on. The next room had, as usual, another telephone. However, the exits here were far more numerous.

As she had for the last two, Ring went for the phone. This time, however, the Navi's face seemed to do nothing but fall as she listened. "'This many to the left'... Oh. Oh, no. Mary-chan, you wouldn't happen to know the square root of thirty-five times fifty point four, would you?"

"Wow... I'm glad those viruses aren't chasing us anymore, de gutsu," said Gutsman, voicing the thought of all six friends.

"Okay," muttered Chisao to himself, "that's two thousand, five hundred twenty... Then the zero as a placeholder..." Silently thanking the heavens that they had a mathematics-proficient friend, Mary and Kaita settled back to quietly wait and let him focus. However, something else served as an unwelcome distraction: the soft sound of marching feet, getting louder and closer by the moment. "...So, fifteen thousand, one hundred twenty plus two thousand, five hundred... Those are viruses, aren't they?"

They were. It seemed there was a point to having so many openings to this room. That way, even more viruses than what the three had faced before could pour into the room. "I can handle this myself, de gutsu-you focus on that problem!" Gutsman told his Operator, already getting to work on deleting the first approachers with his Guts Machine Gun. Chisao nodded his understanding, frowning as he finished.

"I'm not going to find the square root of one thousand, seven hundred sixty-four with a snap of my fingers," he said, biting his lip at the chaos unfolding on his PET screen. "I think someone should go ahead of the others after I figure this out."

"Because if all three of our Navis try to dash for the right door, with nobody staying behind to cover us, they'd be as good as deleted," explained Mary to Kaita before he could voice his protests.

"I'll do it," volunteered Turboman. Ring started to protest, but he explained, "Your attacks are a lot more effective at deleting these guys than mine, and I'm also faster than Gutsman, so I'll be able to get further away from the viruses."

She sent out another Ring Boomerang attack before sighing in defeat. "I guess you're right," she conceded, watching the green rings tear through the approaching viruses before using the return trip to delete the ones that swarmed in to fill the gap. "But if there's trouble, I'll be sure to show up!"

"Figures," groaned Chisao, causing the other five to look at him in surprise. "It's the forty-second door to the left. Good luck, Kaita!"

The black-haired boy nodded his understanding. "Thanks!" Turboman used a Turbo Wheel attack to begin clearing the path, not even waiting for it to finish before he ran for the door. The hallway was long, and the red Navi was finding that he still hadn't left the virus problem behind; a Shockwave attack from behind sent him flying forward. "There're some Metools behind you, Turboman," Kaita informed his Navi, taking out a Battlechip. "Cannon! Slot-in!" As his Operator fired away behind him, the Navi sped up-he was almost there...

This time, there were only six different paths, including a chute in the middle of the ceiling. Shrugging, he picked up the phone.

_"Beam me up!"_

"Guess there's only one way to go, huh?"

* * *

Arrow hadn't had much of a break from her job; the two brown-haired higher-ups, Black and her true Operator, Yumi, had come to compliment Nikumu on the good plan. Arrow had been forced to muster up her longest and most scathing phone calls yet so that her 'Operator' could show off to them. According to Nikumu, those two didn't do much to deserve their higher paychecks. She actually thought that she deserved their position for this success. As far as Arrow was concerned, if Nikumu didn't have a clue about what was going on, her assigned Navi wasn't going to tell her. This plan was oddly good for one masterminded by Nikumu, but the constant manipulation of the phone lines' system was starting to wear Arrow out. She almost hoped that someone would stop her, if only so she could get some rest.

"That was '_almost_ hoped'," Arrow muttered to herself as a familiar red Navi abruptly fell out of the ceiling, landing on his face. Raising her voice, she taunted, "So, you think you're going to stop me?"

Turboman recognized the voice. "You again?" he asked, getting to his feet. "If your Netbattling's as bad as it was last time, I think this fight's already over." Arrow didn't have a vocal comeback for that. Instead, she quietly whipped out her bow and shot her blindingly fast Lightspeed Arrows at her opponent, sending him flying backward on top of giving him a shock.

"Nice trick," Kaita said, also surprised by the sudden attack. "Try this! Battlechip: Spread Gun! Slot-in!"

Arrow grinned. "The same chip you used the first time. How _original_." Taking the edge from her voice, she called, "Nikumu-sama, there's trouble! Please send me a Barrier chip!"

"What, you can't just make some barrier yourself?" grumbled a woman from the other end. "All right, all right, where is it..." Turboman didn't wait for Arrow's incompetent Operator to find the chip, simply firing on her. She realized too late that help wouldn't be coming; the array of bullets shot her out of the air in mid-jump, leaving her to skid across the floor to a stop. Then, Nikumu finally said, "Barrier, slot-in!" The clear shield formed, protecting its owner from absolutely nothing.

Kaita grinned. "Battlechip: Vulcan! Slot-in!" Turboman took aim and waited for the Barrier to fade. However, Arrow wasn't as incompetent as her Operator. She used the time that the shield covered her to get back on her feet and start heading for the huge switchboard in the center of the area. As the sound of Turboman's weapon firing reached her ears, she began running in a zigzag pattern. The trick was older than the Internet itself, but it was still effective. None of the machine gun's bullets hit.

"Lightspeed Arrow!" As the arrows shot forward, Turboman simply jumped to the side. But that was time enough for Arrow to reach her destination. She taunted, "I wouldn't attack if I were you... Or do you want to be the one credited with crashing the phone network when you miss? Lightspeed Arrow!"

Turboman narrowed his eyes as she drew her bow back, realizing that Arrow was right. This time, she shot twice. Her target sidestepped the first three arrows; as he watched the next attack whistle past him on the opposite side, he taunted, "Missed me!"

"But was I even planning on hitting you? Roulette Shaft!" The arrows hadn't gotten out of Turboman's path before the more powerful arrow struck him on the chest, sending him flying backwards before its flashing colors stopped on blue. Arrow smirked as a huge waterspout swept him up.

"Turboman!" Kaita gasped. The red Navi crashed to the ground as the Aqua-element attack released him, blue bits of data leaking from small cuts on his body.

Shakily, Turboman got to his feet. "I'm okay, Kaita..."

"Not for long. Lightspeed Arrow!" The green archer shot sideways, her arrows speeding out in a wide row. Arrow grinned. With the damage, there was no way Turboman could evade...

...And just then, Ring came shrieking in at just the right angle to send herself and Turboman sprawling, Arrow's attack flying harmlessly over their heads. "I told you I'd come," she said cheerfully. Then, she noticed her companion's state. "Whoa! What happened?"

"She's hiding behind the switchboard," Turboman explained as he and Ring dodged another set of arrows. "We can't hit her without damaging it!"

Ring smiled knowingly at him, shaking her head-an impressive feat, considering that she was also backflipping over a horizontal trio of Lightspeed Arrows. "_You_ can't, maybe. But as for me, it's easy as pie!" She plucked the two largest rings from the bottoms of her pigtails and hurled them sideways. "Ring Boomerang!" A surprised yelp and a loud thump were the responses she got from Arrow as the rings sent the archer flying out from her hiding spot. "Now, let's hit her with everything we've got!"

"Right! Battlechip: Flame Tower! Slot-in!" As his Operator finished sending the chip, Turboman sent the attack on its way with a punch to the ground. Arrow couldn't evade it fast enough. Her right leg was hit badly by the flames. Wincing from the injury, she shot another row of arrows toward her enemies, but all three Navis knew it was no use.

"Care to do the honors, Turboman?" Ring asked with a grin.

"Of course! Turbo Wheel!" The red Navi's basic attack smashed into the arrows, plowing through them with ease, before hurtling into Arrow. The damage was too heavy for her to continue. The archer logged out, interrupting her scream of pain.

"Nice one!" Ring's mitten-gloved hand went flying through the air next to Turboman's shoulder. She frowned. "Hey, you're supposed to high-five me. It's a partners thing, right?"

Turboman couldn't help but laugh. "Right."

* * *

It wasn't until two in the morning that Arrow, now fully repaired, managed to slip away from Nikumu's clutches and continue on her mission. The Internet was deserted at this early hour; the faint taps of her boots as she dashed toward her next target area were the only sounds to be heard. Of course, she did have someone to contact if things took a turn for the worse-Black, Yumi, or both of the two would probably be awake even at this hour, working or out having a drink somewhere, and she had both of their PET numbers in memory. There hadn't been any trouble before, though, and she wasn't worried. This was what she'd been designed for: a perfectly routine scouting job, only there was nothing 'perfectly routine' about where she was going.

The rift she'd seen on an earlier trip was still there. After slipping through it, Arrow found herself in a dark, seemingly endless void: the Ura Net. "Such... nice decor," she muttered to herself as she continued on, looking around at the floating bodies of slowly disintegrating Navis and viruses. Arrow hoped that what she sought was near-some said that the dark depths of the Ura Net rattled the toughest of Navis, and it certainly seemed to be true. Nothing was around her except darkness and the faintly glowing dead... and two silvery pinpricks of light. She allowed herself a smirk-this could be it!

After her approach, she peered past one of the gleaming statues at the area's entrance to find a lavender portal sitting behind two guard viruses. They were Dream Bits, no less-nothing screamed that she'd struck gold like those. She frowned. If it weren't for Nikumu, she'd be slipping past with a whisper of 'Stealth Mode'... but she'd been modified to seem like a more average Navi, and so this ability was temporarily lost. Arrow would have to shoot them down. "Lightspeed Arrow!" she called, firing on the nearest Dream Bit. It turned, her three arrows like beams of light protruding from its back. It promptly received six more to its head crystal, deleting it. Its companion was aware of her now, a fact it proved to her by opening fire. She jumped onto the statue's bald head and shot downward, listening to the Dream Bit's gunshots ping on the silver head's face before they reached her level. The Navi leapt off her perch to land on the virus's other side, ending the fight with a cry of "Roulette Shaft!"

Her assailants were dealt with; now, it was time for business. She approached the portal, ready for whatever it had in store for her...

Arrow scowled as a faint beeping sound echoed through her head-it was already time for Nikumu to get up. She hadn't managed to actually see what was inside this place, but at least Arrow knew where to find it again. Sighing over the lost opportunity, she stored the address in her memory and logged back into her PET.


	5. We'll Find Stamps Soon Before Long

As she got ready to close up shop, Kido Shuuko looked out at the calm, peaceful night and sighed happily. She enjoyed nights like this, when all was quiet...

"AAAIIIIIEEEEEEEE!" came a loud scream from inside, disturbing the peace for miles around. Shuuko sighed and turned to enter Higureya, whose proprietor was the one causing all the ruckus.

"Higure-san, what's happening?" she asked as she entered.

The otaku turned slowly, a piece of paper in his hand. "If we don't get about five hundred thousand zenny in the next day, we're finished, demasu!" he gasped. "How will we manage to do that?"

After hearing the news, Shuuko had frozen in place, just as shocked as Higure was. "I... I don't know," she said.

"We have to think of something, demasu!"

"I know, but what? Hey, wait! We could hold a contest!" she exclaimed, her face lighting up with the realization.

"What kind of a contest, demasu?" asked Higure glumly, pulling Shuuko's mood down a bit too. "Not a tournament... remember what the turnout for the last one was?"

"True," said Shuuko, "but the prize didn't really appeal to many Netbattlers, even if it was very good. Something that hasn't been done before, with the best prize ever..."

Higure was already getting the keys to his van. "We'll go to the sports store for ideas!" he said. "Digital mountain climbing or racing or some such, demasu..."

"According to my calculations," interrupted Numberman, "it will take us thirty-two minutes and twelve seconds to get there. By that time, it will be closed."

"Wait!" exclaimed Shuuko, struck with inspiration. "Mountain climbing... racing... orienteering!"

Higure was clueless, having never heard of the sport. "Orient-what?"

"Orienteering," repeated Shuuko. She explained, "The competitors are given a map and a compass and have to navigate through unfamiliar territory. Along the way, there are checkpoints with different stamps at them, and the person who stamps his or her map at the most of them within the time limit wins." Before Higure could ask how she knew, she said, "I participated in an event last summer."

There was a long pause.

"We're saved, demasu!" exclaimed the chip otaku, abruptly taking Shuuko's hands and dancing around the store. "We'll get flyers put up everywhere by tomorrow, and we'll charge five hundred zenny per person-sure, it'll take a lot of contestants, but I'm sure it'll work. And maybe we can get someone from Densan News Network down here, too-but there's no time to lose, demasu! Let's work on those flyers!"

"Er... Right!"

* * *

The next day, Kaita found it impossible to ignore the bright flyers around town, five tacked to every telephone pole and one on every door. "Navi Orienteering Competition?" he wondered. "Turboman, have you ever heard of something like that?"

"Nope," Turboman responded bluntly. "It sounds more interesting than sitting around and doing nothing all weekend, though," he continued, thinking it over. "And I bet there's some sort of prize, too! Why not give it a try?"

"Well, okay," said Kaita. "Higureya Chip Shop, huh? I've never been there before. Let's go, Turboman!"

* * *

When they arrived, Higureya wasn't just crowded. It overflowed with competitors, who were standing outside the little shop in hordes. Kaita shoved his way inside as quickly as he could, where the brown-haired man behind the counter was screaming, "WE'RE RICH!" at the top of his lungs. By his side, a redheaded woman wearing a strange-looking frog hat was scribbling furiously into a notebook.

The purple-haired woman who was already signing up five people at the same time said, "Could you wait over there, please? I'll only be a few more minutes." After a long while, she finally pushed a clipboard to him. "Just put down your name and your Navi's name, pay five hundred zenny, find a spot to plug in over there, and you'll be ready!"

"Oh, um... hi, Kaita-kun," said a familiar voice from behind the boy.

"Mary-chan!" exclaimed Kaita. "Are you entering the contest?"

"You bet she is!" called Ring as Mary put down the pair's names. "I was on the Internet earlier this morning, and I saw that there's going to be a huge prize! We're definitely going to win!"

"Not if we do first!" Turboman shot back.

"Everyone!" called Shuuko, stopping all conversation. "Plug-in and get ready!"

"Hello-pyu!" greeted a childish voice as the Navis entered Higureya's homepage. To everyone's surprise, it was filled with miles of thick jungle, with a massive mountain towering up from the center of the page. The owner of the childish voice, an equally childish and blue-tinted Navi, continued, "I'm Aquaman-pyu! Me and Numberman are going to be the announcers in the Internet!"

"And I'm Midorikawa Kero, the real-world correspondent!" said the redhead, enthusiastically overpowering anyone trying to talk over the announcements. "We've got an impressive turnout here at the world's first orienteering competition for Navis, and it most definitely won't disappoint! Okay, now let's explain a few things. There're twenty checkpoints hidden throughout the webpage before you, and you have two hours to find them, get your map stamped, and hurry over to the finish line! The one with the most stamps wins!" As an example, Aquaman held up a large Metool stamp. "They're all on noticeably different landmarks, so it should be easy to find them if you don't get confused. Of course, no pulling pranks-we'll know if you do!"

At Numberman's frantic signal, Aquaman took the spotlight back from Kero before she could hijack the whole announcement. "And now for the prize-pyu! It's a bunch of Battlechips, and some of them are really rare-pyu!" In the real world, Shuuko took a mid-sized tray out from behind the counter. It was piled with Battlechips; this caused Higure to regain his senses.

"Huh? Nobody told me that we had a prize, demasu..." He frowned. "Well, they don't seem to be too bad. No, wait a minute!" His eyes, fine-tuned to detect even the most minute trace of a rare chip, suddenly sent warning signals racing through his brain. "That's a _METEOR_ chip, demasu! What's that doing in-Gold Fist? Triple Lance? AAAAGH!"

"I'm sorry, Higure-san, but I thought that you'd react this way, so I didn't tell you," said Shuuko sheepishly.

"And it's a good thing, too!" chirped Kero. "According to this poll, only twenty-five percent came because they thought that a Navi orienteering contest would be interesting," she read off the notebook before her. "The other seventy-five heard about the prize, and ninety-two percent of those polled don't even know what orienteering is!"

"Oops," laughed Shuuko nervously, blushing slightly. "I guess we should've put something about it on the posters..." She gave her employer a reassuring pat on the back. "Don't worry! I'm sure we'll be able to buy the chips back." Higure didn't recover at all, and she nervously added, "I hope so, anyway..."

"Anyway," said Aquaman, "let's start this-pyu!" The little Navi summoned a pastel-hued pipe and pointed it skyward. "On your mark-pyu, get set-pyu..." A huge burst of water shot up from the pipe as Aquaman shouted, "Go!"

"And they're off!" shouted Kero as the Navis burst forward, nearly trampling poor Aquaman as he tried to return to the commentator's box. "Who will emerge victorious in two hours' time? Who knows-but for now, let's track a few of our contestants and cheer them on!"

* * *

The Navis went their separate ways, and Ring was soon deep in the digital jungle. "Landmarks, huh?" she wondered to herself, looking down at the map before her. "So, around here, there should be a hill," she said, looking up at her map to find it right in front of her. Hovering just above its peak was a Garuu-shaped stamp. "Awesome! At this rate, those Battlechips are mine!" she laughed as she walked forward, disregarding the odd features of the hill before her until she smacked into its one-dimensional form and caused it to topple over.

She stared up at the little wolf. It floated there, exhibiting no helpful qualities whatsoever. Like the unreachable light at the end of a long and terrible tunnel, the stamp hovered in the air, far above Ring's head. "You're kidding," she muttered, looking from the painted flat to the stamp, still perched on nothing. "You have _got_ to be kidding." It kidded her not; there it floated, high above her reach. After a few more minutes of glaring at it, she said, "I hope it's not fragile. Ring Boomerang!" The plastic Garuu's head was sliced off, but the important part of it dropped to the ground in one piece. After stamping her map, she tossed it upwards, where it suspended itself in the air once again. "Now then... this one's to the north of here..."

* * *

Gutsman wandered about, already lost. "So, there's a river here, de gutsu..." he muttered to himself, looking up. Before him stretched a vast desert, with no signs of water in sight.

A window popped up beside him. "Gutsman?" asked Chisao, wishing fervently that he was allowed to provide something more useful than a limited amount of moral support. Watching his brother's Navi (when he made dumb mistakes, ownership of Gutsman magically reverted back to Dekao) stumble about was pretty frustrating.

"What, de gutsu?" he asked innocently, oblivious to both the problem at hand and a second one that was currently in the bushes to either side of him, its two key components waiting for Chisao's window to vanish.

"I'll put this as nicely as I can," he said, taking a few deep breaths to calm himself to the point where he wouldn't shout. "You've got the map _upside-down, Gutsman!_"

Gutsman blinked at it and turned it around experimentally. Ignoring the snickering coming from the bushes, he realized, "So that's why it was so hard to understand, de gutsu!"

"Yes!" exclaimed Chisao. "Now, just keep it that way, and you won't have much more trouble. Good luck!" With that, the screen disappeared, and Gutsman was left to his own devices.

Gutsman studied the map for a few more moments before pressing on. Unfortunately, those moments were just enough for the other trouble to make itself known. Gutsman hadn't even looked up before Arrow paralyzed him with a well-timed Roulette Shaft. Sparkman calmly hoisted Gutsman over his head and shoved him head-first into a nearby tree stump, where his paralysis wore out. Arrow and Sparkman high-fived each other and went off to find more hapless contestants to trick.

* * *

Turboman had already found three of the checkpoints: one in a river filled with Navi-eating piranhas, one in the mouth of a killer whale, and one inside someone's moldy sandwich. None of them had looked half as dangerous on the map, and it made the red Navi suspicious of the next checkpoint, a Billy stamp in the middle of a seemingly peaceful meadow.

It was best to approach with utmost stealth. Turboman crawled forward, flat against the ground, until he heard snapping noises just above him and realized that the spoiler on his back was sticking up and ruining his approach. After picking the leaves and twigs out of it, he decided to walk normally toward the center of the meadow, admiring the flowers surrounding him. "Now, where's that stamp..."

"Wow, this is a collector's edition, puku!" said an obnoxious voice from below a nearby bush. "If I sell this stamp on Nbay, I'll make a fortune, puku!" The owner of the voice soon crawled out, revealing himself to be a short, fat Navi dressed in something similar to scuba gear. Turboman was less concerned about this stranger's looks and more worried over what the little Navi was cheerfully putting in his rucksack-the stamp!

"Hey, you!" Startled, the Navi whirled around, backing away.

"Back off, puku! This stamp is now the property of the great Bubbleman!" proclaimed the fat-lipped Navi, sticking one finger dramatically in the air. He was still backing up in that position when Turboman allowed the tree directly behind Bubbleman to do most of the work for him. Bubbleman crashed into the hard trunk and fell over, dazed. Shaking his head, Turboman took the plastic Billy from the twitching hands of its 'owner' and lifted the map.

That was all the time Bubbleman needed to recover and latch onto the stamp, hanging on for dear life as his much taller opponent wildly threw him around in his attempts to shake the little Navi off. "Just... give... up!" shouted Turboman in frustration, tugging as hard as he could. Bubbleman had planted his feet on Turboman's leg, serving to irritate him further. The two were almost equally matched, one driven by a love for money and the other by a desire to just get this insane contest over and done with already.

"I'll take that!" A pair of pink mittens belonging to a third party suddenly yanked the little Billy from the fighters' hands. Relieved of what all of their strength had been focused on, they toppled to the ground, only able to helplessly watch as Ring stamped her map. "Here you go, Turboman," she said, tossing it over the head of Bubbleman to her friend, who almost dropped it in his surprise.

"Uh, Ring, where should I put this?" he asked after stamping his map. Bubbleman was attempting to climb up the red Navi's leg to reach the stamp, which Turboman found a bit disturbing and very uncomfortable.

Ring thought about it for a moment before deciding, "Mm... aah, just give it to him. He'd take it the moment we left, anyway, and it cuts down on the competition." Before Turboman could say a word, she scolded, "And don't take after your Operator and ask if we'd get in trouble. We can always say this little guy took it while we were off guard or something, can't we?"

"I wasn't going to say anything," he replied, shoving Bubbleman unceremoniously to the ground and tossing the stamp down after him. Snatching up the plastic figurehead and stuffing it in his rucksack, Bubbleman ran off, not even bothering to thank the two.

* * *

It was with a self-assured swagger that Arrow and Sparkman left their latest victim, a humanlike Navi wearing an ornate dress whose detail combined with the high traffic on Higureya's server had left her rather slow, hanging on a flagpole by the skirt to move on to bigger and eviler things. This included carefully stacking Minibombs around the base of Higure's crowning masterpiece: the mountain in the center of the page. There was a stamp at the tip, but why go to all the trouble of climbing for it when other, more violent options were available?

"That should be enough," decided Teruo after the mountain's base was lined with Minibomb pyramids. "Toss this, and the whole thing'll go down! Minibomb, slot-in!" The final one precariously balanced between Sparkman's spikes as he took aim.

"Here it-" began Sparkman, lifting his arms to throw... and that was when something descended upon him and Arrow, swallowing them both whole.

Teruo openly gaped in shock, attracting the attention of the rule-abiding contestants around him. "What the heck? Sparkman!"

There were three things that were apparent about the mysterious attacker from the start: it was red, it was gelatinous, and it had a Kinglish accent. _"Good heavens! _What_ is that horrible taste?"_ exclaimed the blob.

As the red mass proceeded to eject two Navi-shaped bits of itself before sighing in slight relief, Turboman arrived on the scene, staring at it in disbelief. "It can talk?" he asked, paying no attention as the goo-covered forms of Arrow and Sparkman landed behind him with two simultaneous splats.

_"Why, yes, it can talk," _said the pile of gunk indignantly. _"My name is Proto, and I-oh, good lord, what is this-errrrrrgh..."_ It was obvious what the problem was at a glance; Proto's absorption of the mountain wasn't finished, as its sharp tip was buried a few inches in.

"Let me see if this helps it any... Ring Boomerang!" called Ring, concentrating her rings on the area in front of the mountaintop. The red goo cleared away a bit when the rings hit it, revealing the tip of the stuck object. Turboman quickly grabbed it before the goo could close over it, and between his and Ring's pulling and Proto's pushing, it came free.

_"Thank you, mates," _said the very large and amorphous mass of red goo, sealing the relatively small hole the two had managed to put in it in the blink of an eye. _"I was beginning to fear that I'd never get that thing out of me. Have you any idea how uncomfortable it was? I was trying to have it for a little afternoon snack, but I suppose that it was a tad too sharp. I really should watch what I absorb. I'm not as young as I used to be, you know._" Proto straightened._ "Anyway, I must repay you somehow..."_

Turboman frowned, thinking. "I don't know. I guess it would be nice if you didn't absorb too many other important things... Someone probably worked pretty hard on designing that mountain, after all."

_"Really?_" The red blob thought it over, and finally seemed to nod._ "Well, I suppose that wouldn't be too hard. Anything for you two!" _Proto ejected a pocketwatch from itself, flipping it open to check the time. _"Great Scott, I'm missing my cricket game with Serenade. I must be off! Cheerio!"_ And with that, Proto moved off to some other part of the Internet, leaving behind Turboman, Ring, the dripping-wet mountaintop, and the two miserable-looking and equally sodden troublemakers.

Arrow moaned as she managed to drag her unwilling body into a sitting position. "Nikumu-san, I'm sorry," she sighed, cringing in preparation of a scolding. But all she got in reply was silence. Surprised, she repeated, "Nikumu-san? What's going on?"

"We've got trouble, Sparkman! Return!" called Teruo, an unusual amount of urgency in his voice. Sparkman and the other three didn't even have much of a chance to process what the brat in the blue-and-purple newsboy cap had said before the Navi was plugged out.

Ring grinned. "Ha! I bet it's the Net Police that-oh!" To her surprise, she disappeared from sight as well, Turboman quickly following her in going back to his Operator's PET. Arrow stared in fright at the disappearances.

"Oh, no... They've found us, haven't they? What'll they do to me when they've got me?" wondered Arrow, now completely alone. Though she'd never been caught before, she'd heard enough rumors about how the Net Police dealt with multiple-time offenders to petrify anyone with fear. But soon, the worry gave way to laughter. "Hey, stop it, that tickles! Quit messing with my data! What're you doing-"

She logged out, emerging in a vacant PET. When she saw who was holding it, she was understandably surprised. "Black?"

"Don't gawk, it's rude," teased the brunette. "Aren't you going to thank me?"

Arrow frowned, still a bit confused. It didn't help that Black cheerfully smiling was, though not unheard of, somewhat rare. "Well, okay, thanks... but where's Nikumu?"

Her rescuer held up his wrist so that the PET screen faced out and pointed through the window that seperated them from the unfolding scene. Inside, a man that Arrow recognized as one of the entrants in the contest was restraining Nikumu as he talked to a shellshocked Higure. Shuuko, looking rather stunned herself, was busy dialing the police's number on a nearby phone. Mary and Kaita, along with the other participants, were watching the scene unfold on the right side of the room. Even if they were at the right angle to see Black and Arrow, it was doubtful that anything the two did would draw attention away from the tantrum that Nikumu was throwing. "That man's Gorou Misaki, a detective with the Net Police. I figured one of them would be here, what with so many people having come. Just didn't think it would be someone of his rank." With an amused smile, he said, "Either he just came to participate or we're driving them insane down at the Ministry of Science..."

The Navi didn't know how to react to what she'd just seen at first. Black couldn't help but wonder, "Well, it has been a while... you didn't think Yumi would just forget about you, did you?" That told her all she needed to know; she grinned up at the Nova member, pulling up a text box containing a certain Web address. "Nice! You got it!" was the triumphant reaction she received. "Even that's pretty hard to find. I see Nikumu didn't get off your case long enough for you to scout the area, but that's okay. We've got time to do it later."

Arrow rolled her eyes. Now that she knew Black was happy, she could get to what was most important to her. "Okay, okay, it's all totally peachy. Now, can I have my invisibility back? Between that and Nikumu's horrible Operating, I'm losing to some little kid's Navi."

"Only if you cower at my feet the way you did to Nikumu," Black replied, his tone completely serious. Arrow just glowered at him. After a moment, he caved. "Fine, fine! I was joking, honest! I'll do it as soon as we get back to base, so let's get out of here."

* * *

"Thank you for your time, Higure-san," said Misaki, signaling the cops behind him to drag the handcuffed woman between them to the police car parked outside. "I'll be taking my leave now." As the brown-haired Net Savior closed the door, the other contestants burst into nervous chatter, the competition forgotten in favor of what had just happened. Kero was frantically scribbling into her notebook, occasionally asking nearby contestants about their opinions on Nikumu's arrest. All in all, it was total chaos.

"Your attention, demasu." Nobody even noticed that Higure was speaking. "This doesn't mean that there isn't a winner, so please listen up..." His patience spent, he yelled, "_Shut up and LISTEN!"_ Everyone quieted as the otaku calmly said, "Thank you. We've tallied the scores, and in second place..."

Inside Chisao's PET, Gutsman crossed his bulky fingers. "Say Gutsman, de gutsu, say Gutsman..."

"is Towa Mary's Ring, demasu!" Mary beamed at Ring as she walked up to accept her prize-twenty Battlechips of varying rarity. Gutsman's shoulders sagged a bit, but he knew that there was still hope; there was one more prize, one more winner... "And the grand prize goes to..."

"Say Gutsman, de gutsu, say Gutsman..."

"Todoroki Kaita's Turboman, demasu!"

Kaita stared up at the tip of the Battlechip mountain, then grinned down at his PET screen. "Awesome job, Turboman!"

"No way, de gutsu... how could they beat me?" wondered Gutsman. Chisao thought about giving him a truthful reply, but decided against it.


	6. House of Panic!

The weekday after the telephone incident began pretty normally. The various workers who'd been angry before had been enticed back with raises, chocolates, and other treats, as well as promises to forget that this mess had ever happened. None seemed happier than Mariko-sensei, but someone in class had heard that that was because she'd gotten a substantial bonus along with a number of praises from the school principal. About the only unusual thing that could be said was that it was pouring rain outside, and even that had been predicted by the weatherman that morning. As Class 5-1 continued with their schoolwork, Turboman was surprised by Ring's appearance in Kaita's desk.

"Call Kaita's mum and ask her if he can do his homework at Mary-chan's place," she said, opening a word processing program and typing up directions. "These should sort of be from Mary-chan's house to your house, but you won't need them until afterwards. I asked Mum-Mary-chan's mum, I mean-and she said she'll pick us up. Sure beats walking in the rain, that's why I thought of this."

"I haven't even asked Asuna-san!" exclaimed Turboman, flustered.

Ring rolled her eyes. "Well, ask her, then! School's almost over, you don't have much time! Chisao's mum said yes, y'know."

"Okay, okay!" With that, Turboman composed the e-mail and sent it off. As he did, he thought of something. "I know you've told her mother, but what about Mary-chan?"

Ring shrugged. "I'll get around to it." The message box flashed, and she ran over to see Asuna's response. "She said yes! I knew she would!"

"I kind of hoped she would, too," confessed the red Navi. "This afternoon would've been such a yawn..." Closing the e-mail, he said, "Now, you should really tell Mary-chan about this."

The yellow-clad Navi sighed, "Okay, okay..."

* * *

Teruo stared glumly out the window at the rain pouring down outside his house. "I'm booooored," he whined, resting his head against the glass. "Sparkman, aren't you finished yet?"

"Completely, Teruo-san," responded the orange Navi, reappearing in his Operator's PET. "From what I heard, they're going to that Towa girl's house-a perfect opportunity, right?" Sparkman would've grinned if he'd had a mouth as he said, "Things'll work for us this time, I'm sure."

"Yeah. We'll finally get back at those little brats for beating us!" proclaimed Teruo, ignoring how close he and Kaita were in age. "Now, where does this chick live?" he asked Sparkman, bringing his wrist up to look at the PET.

"Just down the street," said the Navi. Teruo raised his eyebrows in surprise. The neighborhood where he lived was home to the richest residents of Densan City. "Her mother's a fashion designer from Kingland," Sparkman explained.

"Ah," replied the dark-haired boy as he attached his PET to a laptop sitting next to him. With the push of a button, Sparkman was projected onto the monitor. "Well, then, let's give her a good welcome to Japan!"

* * *

The car was not unusual; the driver was not unusual; indeed, Mary's friends had very little warning of what awaited them when they got out of the car. "Welcome to our humble abode!" said Ring, even as Kaita and Chisao stared in awe at the three-story mammoth of a house that loomed over them. "Completely pathetic compared to the family manor in Kingland, but we manage."

Mary's mother just smiled wryly at this comment and unlocked the door, ushering the three children in. "We have pink lemonade, cookies, crisps, there's some other stuff in the fridge..."

"Cookies, please," requested Chisao.

"Good choice!" said the blonde-haired woman brightly. "Oh, yes, and the plug-in port's right next to the stairwell if you want your Navis out." Mary had already plugged her Navi in, and the result was quite a surprise for her friends.

"That's so cool!" said Kaita with a huge grin, running over to do the same. Chisao was right behind him. "Wow, Turboman, you're really tall!" exclaimed the eleven-year-old, staring up at his six-foot-tall Navi in awe.

"I know! Isn't it neat?" Ring explained, "Us Navis can't actually knock things over and stuff-some silly law here in Japan-but we can show up like this."

Mary continued, "We had a whole materialization chamber in Kingland, since Dad's a supporter of their science program. But it's not legal here, like Ring-chan said, so this is as good as it gets."

Ring smirked. "Now who's bragging, Mary-chan?" she teased.

"Well, I would like to take you guys over there someday," said Mary. "Maybe on summer break."

"I'd love to go!" As they went upstairs, Chisao asked, "So, which assignment do you want to start on?"

Giving her Operator a confused look, Ring asked, "Assignment? We're not supposed to do homework, right?"

Mary reminded, "Ring-chan, we got together to do just that, remember?"

"Don't be _silly_, Mary-chan. We're going to play on the Gamestation V! Study groups at this point in your life are all about having fun and talking with your friends first, and actual homework and boring stuff after Mum comes in and makes you do it," said Ring knowingly. "It's not until college and the last bit of high school that you actually have to study."

Mary frowned. "Are you sure about that?"

"Positive. Besides, it'll be much more fun this way. Right, Turboman?"

"Right!"

* * *

A small _ping_ sounded from the one-eyed hacker's laptop, and Black frowned at the message that appeared on his screen. "He didn't even report to me before starting on this mess, like he was supposed to," he said placidly. "What bad form." At the moment, he couldn't care less about Teruo's unpermitted misbehavior. All of his attention was on a text box. The scroll bar revealed its enormity, and the contents were gibberish to anyone with even slightly less skill than him. It was currently less than one-fourth of the way done.

"I hope Yumi's ready soon," he muttered to himself as he tried typing in another line before pressing the Enter key. A second window, simulating what would actually happen when this section of the huge project gained a physical form, demonstrated his failure as a huge, slightly lumpy pile of cheery yellow goop. "I'd love to see how to make this thing work from scratch, but he's getting impatient."

* * *

After two hours of fun, games, and the day's homework, Ring had urged Mary to give her friends the grand tour of the house. As Turboman noticed, her wanting to show it off went back on her earlier verdict of 'completely pathetic', but Ring countered that that was only in comparison to their Kingland home. It was still impressive, she claimed, just not _as _impressive.

It was certainly impressive enough for Kaita and Chisao, as their spending the tour amazed proved. Unfortunately, something was bound to go wrong, and go wrong it did near the end of their trip.

"And this is the storage room. Which... is boring, but it's still part of the house," explained Ring as the guests looked around at the assorted cleaning equipment. "Everything's automated, so we don't need to pay maids or anything. Saves some money and all!"

"Everyone has automated things around now," noted Mary. "This isn't even the newest stuff..."

_"Well, well, well. If it isn't little Miss Mary and her annoying Navi!"_ The voice came from around them, echoing a bit. Still, Mary knew it well.

"Sparkman! What are you doing here?"

Jeeringly, the Navi explained, _"Teruo-san and I feel that your fluke win a couple of days ago shouldn't go unpunished."_

"Fluke?" scoffed Ring. "Mary-chan and I kicked your sorry butt!"

_"I _was_ going to ask if you wanted to surrender quietly, but your attitude says it all. In that case, I don't have much of a choice, do I? Farewell, children..."_ A flash of laser light came from the wall to the nearest cylindrical object. The shadowed machine wheeled itself into the light, its long stalk lifting threateningly into the air.

"Oh, come on. It's just a vacuum cleaner!" laughed Kaita.

The vacuum cleaner almost seemed to deflate for a moment. Then, it suddenly grew fangs, claws, and an assortment of spikes and black paneling.

"But... but... that isn't even necessary for doing its job," protested Kaita weakly. "What are the chances..."

"Forget the chances, just run!" shouted Turboman as the emo floor cleaner revved up, ready to suck the three kids and their PETs into oblivion. Chisao and Kaita made a break for the door, then turned to see their friend walking over to them painfully slowly. They were almost ready to lift her up and carry her out of harm's way when she stopped them.

"Don't worry," reassured Mary. "That vacuum isn't fast at all, so we won't have to run. It's very nice of you to volunteer, though," she said, smiling. "Come on, let's go!"

Inside his hijacked vacuum, Sparkman frowned as he wondered, "Huh? What's that mean, 'isn't fast'?" He checked one of the screens in its computer and swore. "A snail could win against this thing in a race! Just my luck!" Kaita and his friends were long gone, and it would take days for the emo vacuum to catch up. Sighing, Sparkman directed it to trundle over to a plug-in port on the wall, where he beamed himself into the house network. "Much better. Now, what should I do?"

Being on the Internet reconnected Sparkman with Teruo's PET, which was still connected to the laptop sitting on the teenager's lap. In response to his Navi's question, he replied, "Oh, I don't know. Set the dump on fire for all I care-my favorite show's on right now! Leave me alone!" and closed Sparkman's window, leaving the Navi to his own devices.

"Well, okay!" said Sparkman with a shrug, already looking for the proper area.

* * *

"It's kind of obvious that Sparkman'll want to try something else," Chisao noted. The three children and their Navis were heading to the first floor. That way, if anything serious happened, they would be closer to an exit. To Mary, he said, "We'd better tell your mother. She can call the Net Police, and they can sort this guy out."

"Net Police? Who needs the Net Police for Sparkbutt?" jeered Ring.

"Chisao-kun's right. Sparkman may not be the most threatening Navi, but we need the Net Police to _arrest _him," Mary told her Navi. "If we tried, he could easily say that we're the ones harrassing him. If he's really got friends to cover his tracks, there'd be no easy way to prove he was doing anything wrong."

Chisao began to agree, but a scream from downstairs cut him off. "Towa-san!"

"_Mum!_" The three rushed downstairs, Mary lagging slightly behind the other two. As Kaita and Chisao returned their Navis to their PETs, she stopped at the bottom, breathing as deeply as she could.

"Mary-chan, please don't push yourself," Ring said, worried for her Operator's sake more than she was for the house. The room around them was burning hot, and the heat was coming from the appliances in the kitchen. Everything that Sparkman had touched was in flames. Mary took deep-but shuddering-breaths, her fear not helping her to return to a normal heart rate.

As Chisao helped Mary's mother out of the house, Kaita turned to see the girl sitting on the stairwell. "Mary-chan, we have to go!" he called, running over to her. "Either we see what's going on here or we get out-whichever one happens, we've got to hurry!"

"A-All right..." Shakily, Mary got to her feet. "There's a fire extinguisher in the closet. If you put the fire out near the leftmost part of the oven, there're two ports that we can use."

Kaita nodded. "Got it!" As he turned to get the red object from the closet, Mary took a deep breath.

"I think I'll be okay now," she told Ring quietly. If Kaita could hear her, he made no indication. "Ring-chan, plug out." The worry still evident on her face, the pink-eyed Navi vanished from the room.

Meanwhile, Kaita had put out most of the flames. "Come on, let's plug in!" he called over his shoulder.

"Right," his friend agreed.

_"What? You think you two can just waltz up here, huh?"_ asked Sparkman. Suddenly, streams of flame flew out of the appliances. Kaita dove under and weaved to the side, making it to the plug in port; however, Mary wasn't as lucky. The fire had her pinned against the wall, where she was coughing uncontrollably.

"Mary-chan!" yelled Kaita.

He wasn't the only one who appeared alarmed. _"I-but-WHY DIDN'T YOU GET OUT OF THE WAY?"_

"She _can't_, knucklehead!" yelled Ring. "She's got a heart problem, she can't run or do anything that might wear her out!"

"Don't... tell..." Mary managed to whisper before her coughing worsened.

"I'm sorry," the Navi told her Operator quietly. To Kaita, she cried, "Don't just stand there, send Turboman in to wallop Sparkman!"

"But-"

"Ring's right, Kaita-kun," Turboman said. "It'll take you more time and put you in more danger to get back over to Mary-chan than it will to beat this guy down!"

Kaita took one last look at the spot where Mary was trapped before turning back to the plug in port. "If you say so," he murmured. "Plug in, Turboman EXE! Transmission!"

Sparkman was staring at the controls when Turboman arrived, poking his needles into them rapidly. "Turn off... turn off... why aren't they turning off-oof! Hey!" he yelled at the red Navi after a well-placed Turbo Wheel sent him flying away from the blue screens.

"It's no use, Kaita-kun!" Turboman exclaimed after a few moments. "Someone's controlling this from the outside."

"Probably one of Sparkman's friends," Kaita said. "I bet they'll stop when Sparkman's beaten! Cannon, slot in!" Sparkman had barely been back on his feet for more than a few seconds when Turboman's attack sent him sprawling once again.

As he got to his feet, he growled, "So that's how you want it, eh? Spark Ball!"

"Kaita, destroy it fast!" Ring yelled from behind him.

"Got it! Battlechip: Vulcan, slot in!" The machine gun's spray of bullets pinged against the orange ball's exterior for a moment before it exploded, allowing the remaining attack to hit Sparkman. "Now, let's finish him off! Battlechip: Flame-"

Suddenly, a window popped up, overlooking Sparkman.

"...and if you won't bother to make sure your Navi doesn't make a fool of himself, you obviously aren't interested enough for Black to spend any time on him," a woman scolded Teruo from his laptop. He noticed them and shook his head at her, embarrassed, but she wasn't planning on just hanging up. "Yes, I see it, you have company waiting. I hope you're sufficiently entertaining to them. I'll be watching, and if Black doesn't hear good words about you, kiss a chance at an upgrade goodbye. Now, go have tea and cookies with your friends," she mocked, closing the connection to leave Teruo glaring at his blank screen.

"Stupid brown-haired people, think they own the world..." he muttered, scowling. "Sparkman!" he yelled next, fishing out a Battlechip. "Let's show him what we've got!"

Kaita put the Flame Tower chip away; if Teruo blocked it, he didn't have any other powerful chips. Meanwhile, Sparkman's Operator had given his Navi a Cannon chip. "Turbo Wheel!" yelled Turboman, sending his attack speeding toward his opponent just before he leapt away.

"Give me a break. Is that it?" asked Teruo with a laugh. "Area Steal!" Sparkman was suddenly at Turboman's back, firing what remained of the Cannon. Caught off guard by the attack, Turboman was sent sprawling.

"Spark Arm!" yelled Sparkman, jabbing his needles down at the spot where Turboman laid. He managed to roll on his side at the last minute, dodging the direct attack. He winced as he heard the electric energy crackling inches from him.

"Battlechip: Area Steal!" Kaita called before spiriting his Navi away from Sparkman's dangerous arms. "Now, while he's off guard! Flame Tower, slot-in!"

"Got it! Flame Tower!" Both Operator and Navi breathed a sigh of relief when Sparkman was logged out. Though Teruo's opinion was expressed in a scream of frustration, Sparkman didn't seem to be complaining.

"Just you wait-I'll get both of you one day!" promised Teruo before he vanished from Kaita and Turboman's view and left their thoughts entirely.

The sprinkler system suddenly poured down on the whole area, letting Kaita and both of the Navis breathe a slight sigh of relief. "Mary-chan!" called Kaita, running to his friend's side. She was breathing-unconscious, but breathing. "Turboman, call the hospital," Kaita ordered, plugging his Navi in. Now, all he could do was sit by Mary's side and wait. "Ring," he asked worriedly, "do you think she'll be okay?"

Ring sighed. "Yeah. No thanks to me." She scowled as she continued, "I hate those dumb holograms. I could've been a million miles away for all the help I was!"

"At least she'll be okay," Turboman reassured Ring. "That's what counts, right?" To Kaita, he said, "I told them everything-they'll be here as soon as possible."

She nodded. "Yeah." There was a moment's pause; the faint sound of a siren became audible. "Hey, don't hold any of this against Mary-chan, okay?" she asked, peering up at them from Mary's limp wrist with a worried look. "She's a great kid, and she's really scared that people won't like her 'cause she can't do everything they can. And... I guess I am too, a little. But don't tell her I said that, okay?"

"Don't worry about it," Kaita said.

Ring smiled. "I'm glad she has friends like you," she said.

"Thanks-I'm glad I know her, too." Kaita's smile wasn't as bright as it would've been-Mary's current state had him worried, despite Ring's reassurances-but it, and the presence of the doctors, still reassured his friend's Navi. "Oh! I'm so glad you're here... no, worry about her, not me! It was just a little smoke-I'm really okay!"


	7. Blackout

After the incident at Mary's house, Kaita and his friends were too paranoid to enjoy the rest of the perfectly normal school week. This spread to their Navis as well. By Saturday, though, Ring was sick of the tense atmosphere around her friends and their Operators.

"I'm going shopping in Internet City, and you two will carry my bags," she announced as the familiar chimes of the school bell rang. "Just like any other bunch of Navis. And our Operators will just hang out at Kaita or Chisao's house, because inviting the hostess over to your house is the polite thing to do."

"We can go back to my house," Mary said. "We can't just invite ourselves to someone else's house, can we?"

Even as Chisao said, "No, she's right-my house it is," Kaita sighed.

"My mother's barely letting me come to school now," he told them. "She's been worrying about me since she found out I was at the hospital..."

Turboman agreed, "Yeah, and it didn't help that Nova had just run off with about five hundred thousand zenny worth of art from the museum. Did you guys see that?"

Mary nodded. "Mum's not sure that Teruo was really with Nova, but she's still worried about what they've been getting away with."

"Come on, come _on_," Ring interrupted. "You're just saying that stuff because you think I'll buy out every fashion store in town! I may go overboard sometimes, but even I have my limits."

"He's serious, Ring," Turboman said. "We have to get back soon, or Asuna-san'll come after us."

"Fine, you can go home and be bored," Ring said to Turboman. To Gutsman, she said, "But as for us two, let's just forget Nova for a day. Is that too much to ask?"

"Not at all, de gutsu," the bulky Navi replied. "But I'm not carrying bags, de gutsu!"

"Bye, Kaita!" called Chisao as the black-haired boy shouldered his backpack and got up. "Send Turboman after Gutsman and Ring later, okay?"

"No problem!" As he left the front of the school behind, Kaita decided to take a quieter route home than his usual one. Still, the trip took him by an electronics store with television sets on display. They were showing the news channel. Kero was presiding over a special report on Nova and its suspected members. There were very few with any sort of description to match the name. One of the faces resembled Teruo's. Kaita frowned as he saw a green-haired girl among the many suspect Navis. The hair was all Arrow, but the rest of it wasn't very accurate. After his mother's protectiveness had subsided a little and he had time to spend in town again, maybe he could fill the Net Police in on how she looked...

"Oh! Like, excuse me!" A woman was walking in his direction, quickly closing the gap between them.

Turboman's eyes narrowed. "She sounds familiar, Kaita-kun," he whispered. "I just can't think of where I've heard that voice before..."

"You're Kaita... erm, what's your last name again?" She seemed to get closer to the boy by the second, violating the 'personal bubble' law with an inaudible pop.

If giving her personal information would make her back off, Kaita was willing to oblige her. "Todoroki," he responded hurriedly, inching away from his interrogator.

Turboman's frown grew deeper. "Maybe it was... Wait, no. Oh, come on, it wasn't that long ago, think, Turboman..." The car-like Navi gasped. "Wait a minute! It's-"

"Todoroki Kaita! What a nice name!" came the woman's voice yet again, interrupting Turboman mid-sentence. Kaita's strategy to get her away from him backfired; she gasped loudly and leaned into his face. "Oh, you're that little boy I saw Netbattling a few weeks ago!" she exclaimed, almost sounding like she was talking about her favorite movie star.

She sounds like the woman that was talking with Teruo!" hissed Turboman. "This could be bad..."

Kaita studied her for a moment as she began chattering away. She wore a short, tight-fitting orange dress over blue jeans and pink boots with thick, short heels. Her sunglasses were the same shade of pink, and her only other accessory was her garishly orange purse. Her hair was blonde to the point of almost being white-he'd been under the impression that Teruo's taunter had been a brunette. "I don't think this is her," he replied as quietly as possible as the woman praised him for his excellent fighting.

She screamed as a man wearing a balaclava suddenly stole her purse. "Stop! Thief!" she yelled. But the street they were on was deserted apart from Kaita and the woman; nobody heard her cries for help other than the somewhat unwilling Kaita. The thief paused for a bit when he'd made it to the end of the road, giving Kaita and his new fan time to catch up with him before he continued down the street.

"Oh, no!" shrieked the woman, causing Kaita to wince and cover his ears. "He's heading toward that warehouse!" As she said it, the security shutters rolled down over the windows and doors on the nearby warehouse, which looked like it had been deserted for a long time. "And he's locked everything down, too! This is just horrible!" She paused. "Oh, wait, he left the port on the outside uncovered, so you can plug in..." She looked down at her companion imploringly, and Kaita sighed and stepped up to the panel near the door.

"I'm doing it, I'm doing it... Plug in, Turboman EXE! Transmission!" With the push of a button, a laser sped to the port, sending Kaita's Navi into the bank's webpage. His image blipped into view on a holoscreen, which was much larger than what Kaita had on his PET.

"Viruses, and lots of them!" Turboman reported to Kaita. "I don't think I've ever seen a few of the ones he's got in there. Not like they'll last long, though. Turbo Wheel!" Most of the lower-level viruses, like the Metools and Garuus, were deleted on the spot. But some didn't even register a scratch. These were higher-level Lava Dragons, which stayed asleep near the back of the area. "Okay, let's try this again. Turbo Wheel!" The projectiles softly dinged off the nearest virus and returned to Turboman's waiting arms. "But why didn't it work?" he wondered aloud. "Maybe I need a Battlechip..."

"Enemy located," said a voice in monotone. Turboman readied his Turbo Wheels once again, knowing what that voice usually belonged to. Sure enough, behind him stood an uncustomized Navi. They weren't known for their speed or strength, so Turboman knew that getting rid of it would be easy as pie. "Battlechip: Meteor," said the Navi calmly. Turboman paled as huge meteors rained down upon the battlefield.

Kaita, meanwhile, was wishing that he had a Barrier Battlechip. "I can't watch," he wailed, peeking at the screen showing Turboman's impending doom through his fingers.

Near Kaita's left ear, the voice of his Navi snapped, "Send over Meteor to destroy the ones this guy sent! Hurry!"

"Okay! Meteor, slot-in!" The meteors were destroyed, but it offered little relief. The standard Navi was now firing off an Aqua Tower. "Area Steal!" was Kaita's next selection. As Turboman vanished, the enemy attempted another Meteor strike.

"You may have good chips, but your aim's still terrible!" taunted Turboman as the Wide Sword on his arm struck home, logging the standard Navi out on contact. Without a Navi to control them, the Meteors vanished.

Kaita grinned, laughing, "Easy as pie, Turboman!"

"Hm... I'm sure that you're expecting me to say 'very impressive', but I'm afraid that the near-disaster you had with those Meteors deducts points." The voice, who could belong to nobody other than the thief, continued on. "What can I say? I'm hard to impress."

Turboman growled, "Who are you, and why're you just sitting there and taunting us? Just send your Navi over here so we can give you something that'll _really_ amaze!"

The thief laughed, cold and harsh. "You may call me Black," he said coolly. "Even if I had a second Navi, I wouldn't plug it in. You haven't destroyed even one of my viruses yet, which leaves me to think that you aren't as good as you seem to think you are." Black melodramatically sighed, "It's like everyone nowadays with a halfway-customized Navi seems to think they can be some kind of big hero. From the way you've been handling Nikumu and Teruo, I was hoping that you'd actually be somewhat decent, not to mention all of those chips that you won. But even with them, you're nothing special. Just another stupid kid and his pathetic Navi..."

* * *

"Geez, he's really laying it on thick," muttered the blonde under her breath. Luckily, Kaita was too engrossed in sending every Battlechip he had to Turboman, hoping to prove Black wrong by destroying one of the Lava Dragons, to notice. "But it is working-the brat _is_ getting mad..." She grinned, knowing that their plan was as good as completed, and silently walked away.

* * *

"Shotgun! Flame Tower! Cannon! Corn Shot!" Four near-identical pings were the only reward Turboman got for his efforts, eliciting a groan of frustration. "Come on, you stupid thing-" Another chip interrupted him mid-rant. Glaring at the nearest sleeping dragon, he took aim at it and unleashed a Spread Gun shot.

* * *

On the other side of the door, Black smirked down at his laptop, which displayed Kaita's Navi in one window and many lines of code in the other. "I do know how to piss these kids off, don't I?" he asked himself, amused, as he rested his finger on the key that would turn his microphone back on. After schooling his face back into a cold sneer, he pressed the key and began, "You're a pathetic excuse for a Netbattler. Couldn't even delete something as weak as that virus... guess that shows who the real weakling is, huh?" In reality, Black had never expected Kaita to destroy the viruses toward the back of the area; he'd programmed them to require a Program Advance to be deleted, and the boy probably didn't even know what that was. It was easy to see that Kaita had gotten frustrated, which played right into Black's hands. He typed one more line into the text-laden window and hit Enter. A small orb of black data, erratically emitting sparks of purple lightning, materialized in front of Turboman. "If you really think you can, just try to hit _this_!"

* * *

"I think I will!" retorted Kaita, pulling out another Battlechip. "Heat Cross, slot-in!" More than ready to oblige his Operator if it meant that their taunter would shut up, Turboman raised the gun and shot at the sparking lump of data. It exploded in a burst of red-and-purple flame and split in all directions, leaving nothing behind. There was a long moment of silence before either realized what had just happened.

"We did it?"

"Hah!" laughed Black, the sound short and harsh. "Thanks, kiddo, you certainly have. Care to see?" A window popped up on Kaita's PET screen, showing a panoramic view of Internet City. But something was horribly wrong with the Navis there. Some shivered, though sweat dripped down their faces. Others looked pale, like they'd be sick at any moment. If they were human, all of them would immediately be diagnosed as feverish. "You've just unleashed an epidemic of unprecedented proportions onto the Internet," he said with sarcastic cheer. "Congratulations!"


	8. Black Plague

"Hey there, boss-man! What's up?" greeted Geminiman, giving his employer a wave and a smirk.

"Things've been so boring lately... When am I going to get some action?" Geminiman wondered, stifling a fake yawn.

The boss grinned up at them-or was it 'him'?-from his seat. "Right now, actually," he said, taking out a memory stick that had been delivered to him an hour ago. He reached down and attached it to the computer. A small, white orb of data that gave off yellow sparks of light materialized before his minion's eyes. "Deliver this to Arrow and Sparkman, and let them hold it for a few seconds; it'll render them immune to this virus. Then, delete it and wait for my instruction."

"I don't get it," muttered Geminiman, placing his hands on the orb. "This whole virus thing is all well and good, and things'll be easy for us with all the Navis dropping like flies, but what do we get out of it?

"Yeah, really," Geminiman agreed, making himself immune as well. He added, "I thought we _weren't_ trying to bring an end to network society," as he split the orb into two and passed one half to his twin, who made it disappear into his hand.

"Biting the hand that feeds you? That's not like you at all, Geminiman," chided the boss. "You do have a point, though." He showed the duo the same address that Arrow had brought to Black as he said, "This should make things clearer. Ever heard of a scientist named Dr. Wily?"

* * *

"You're lying," Kaita said, face ashen. "I didn't-"

"But you did, kiddo, you did!" Black smugly explained, "That orb kept my little plague locked away where nobody could get hurt, and you smashed it to bits. All of your friends' Navis are dying as we speak. You two might as well just kick back and watch 'em all go! Now, I'll just leave you to your pity party. Later!" The video feed from Internet City winked out, leaving Kaita and his Navi alone.

Turboman's thoughts went straight to his friends. Ring and Gutsman had doubtlessly been in Internet City on the yellow-clad Navi's shopping excursion when the outbreak had swept it. They were ill as well, and Kaita's friends had to be worried sick. Thousands of other people were the same way, and it was all his fault...

"How could we know, Turboman?" asked Kaita, though he obviously felt guilty as well. "There's nothing we can do." Sadly, he continued, "Just like he said... 'Kick back and watch 'em all go'..."

Turboman also thought back to Black's little speech. Suddenly, he realized, "No! Kaita, you've got to send me to Internet City!"

"What?"

The red Navi looked his Operator straight in the eye as he explained, "What good would it do Nova to delete their own Navis along with the rest? They have to have a cure. And I don't seem to be affected by the plague at all. I bet it's 'cause I was the one who released it, so I'm the only Navi who can find it."

"I..." Kaita thought over it for a moment, then nodded. "All right. Plug out, Turboman!" The boy sprinted toward an electronics store, which he knew would have computers on display that connected to Internet City, since he'd noticed that the warehouse's system didn't have a link that Turboman could use. The store owner was clearly seeing the effects of the plague; he was staring in horror at his Navi on the counter's computer. "Don't worry, sir, we'll do what we can! Plug in, Turboman EXE! Transmission!"

Turboman materialized in a near-deserted Internet City. After giving the area a quick scan, he dashed toward a different district of the international megalopolis, wondering if he'd manage to find anything that looked even remotely like a cure...

* * *

On the opposite end of Internet City, the Navi holding what Turboman was looking for was heading toward Teruo's homepage after a quick stop at Yumi's. He was taking his sweet time in doing so; the more the brat squirmed, the better. "So, Geminiman, how soon do you think the twerp needs this thing?"

Geminiman split apart from his twin, taking the purple mark on his right cheek with him. He smugly suggested, "Oh, not for a while. Actual damage doesn't start for, what, ten minutes after you catch this thing? I'd say we take five to get some chips out of the shops, ten for pestering carboy, and then we head for-YEOWCH!"

Geminiman stared at his twin in shock before turning to face the Navi responsible for putting a heart-tipped arrow into the other Geminiman's rear end. "Geez! What's your problem, lady?" he yelled.

The blonde-haired Navi girl gave them a glare in response, pink-gloved hands resting on pink-clad hips. "I know you've got the cure program! Hand it over!" she commanded, moving her left hand to form a crossbow with another arrow at the ready.

"Oh, shoot," muttered Geminiman, finally recognizing her.

"What?" asked Geminiman cluelessly, yanking out the arrow with some effort and tossing it away.

"That's a Net Savior. Her name's Roll, and she's been booking the fodder by the dozens," explained the blue-and-purple Navi in an undertone, pointing at the Navi in pink for emphasis. Raising his voice to share the next comment with Roll, he proclaimed, "And we aren't handing the cure over to you!"

Geminiman agreed, "Yeah, we want to see you guys squirm a little more. And don't think you can cute your way into getting us to give it to you! It won't work!"

"I never intended to." Abruptly, Roll called, "Aqua Tower!" The pathways of Internet City were narrow, giving the Geminimen no place to escape the pillar of water. The attack hit them square-on, leaving them spluttering as Roll closed the gap between them.

Though his twin looked panicked, the Geminiman with a mark on his left cheek wasn't ready to give in yet. "It'll take more than that to catch us! Meteoric Burst!" His left hand changed into a buster, and he fired an oblong shot into the air. This wasn't the end of the Navi's attack; next, the golden shot split apart and shot downward. As Roll frantically darted and twisted around the golden rain, the Geminimen ran past her to the end of the street. When she looked toward them, they went in opposite directions, leaving her with a cocky, "See ya!"

"Shoot!" Roll ran to the end of the road, pausing only when a window opened above her.

"Follow the one on the left for now," instructed her Operator before giving her a Battlechip. "Dash Condor, slot-in!"

* * *

Geminiman didn't get much of a respite from being shot at. The Navi hadn't even gotten a few streets away from the scene when he nearly plowed into Turboman. "You're healthy, too," he realized. "And a civilian Navi, no less. So, you're the one who let this loose for us! Thank you!"

"Don't thank me-I'll give you your just desserts right now! Turbo Wheel!" But Geminiman was far too nimble, and his surroundings didn't help. He expertly hopped from one wall to another, high above where Turboman could even consider hitting the other Navi. "Kaita, I need-" Turboman paused.

"That's ri~ight," Geminiman called from the rooftop of a nearby building. "No Battlechips in Internet City!" His right hand shifted into a fat, purple buster with blue vents on the sides. "Don't you wish you had a better attack... one like mine? Swift Shot!" Turboman could barely dodge the first two hits, though the third missed and went behind him. Then, the fourth came screaming down on him, knocking him flat against the ground. Kaita winced, remembering where he'd seen this tactic: Arrow's attack in the phone network. It was just as effective here as it had been there, and Turboman's attacks, just like before, wouldn't do much good.

Kaita desperately suggested, "Turboman, use Turbo Wheel on the building he's on!"

The red Navi protested, "It's too big! I couldn't possibly shake it hard enough."

Geminiman grinned. "That's great! It'd be no good if someone like me could be brought down by some half-baked idea like _that_. Swift Shot!"

Turboman let the first shot begin to box him in, then leapt backward, letting the second shot graze him on the leg. Still, it was less damage than he'd come away with before. "You've got to try!" exclaimed Kaita's voice from behind his Navi.

"No! There's no way it'd work." As Geminiman began shooting again, Turboman continued, "But I do have another idea!" His enemy's golden shots nipping at his heels, he headed for the end of the street-and one of the larger city squares. There was at least half a mile that Turboman could put between himself and Geminiman's lethally fast attacks, and he wasted no time in doing just that.

"Oh, I see. You think I'll be afraid to come down there!" laughed Geminiman. "In which case, you are totally, utterly, completely _wrong_." He leapt confidently from his perch, taking potshots at Turboman as he descended. The red Navi ducked under two shots and leapt forward over one-after which he landed on the edge of the large fountain that took up a good ten-by-ten area of their fighting space. His off-balance landing was not helped by a powerful buster shot from Geminiman, which sent him on a trip to the digital pavement eight feet away. "Yep. Wrongo." He walked along the fountain's rim to Turboman, keeping the carlike Navi within his buster's sights. "Now then, you're on the ground, I've got the deleting shot nice and charged up for you..." He hopped to the ground.

It was exactly what Turboman had been waiting for. "Turbo Wheel!" Geminiman went careening into the fountain, but the red Navi wasn't finished yet-he removed the burning tires from his shoulders once more and plunged them into the fountain, holding them under the surface. "You know, I'm starting to appreciate these fountains," he quipped as the water around the tires began to bubble. The blue-and-purple Navi swore and made to leap before the heat reached him, but Turboman hurled one of the still-hot projectiles at him, hitting him square in the chest and forcing him back in with a splash. The red Navi withdrew the other tire, cringing at Geminiman's screams. "Now, give me the cure program and I won't knock you back," he said, letting one tire travel to a threatening position in his left hand.

"Aaagh-I-just take it!" Kaita was reminded of half an orange-the cure was a half-sphere, apparently. "Half the cure," panted Geminiman, dragging himself out of the fountain. "Other's... with the rest of me... you'll never take me down! This... this was... luck!" His body melted into a ribbonlike form, flying off down the street they'd come from.

"The rest of him?" Turboman was a bit short of breath himself-the fight had taken more out of him than he'd let on. "That doesn't sound good."

Kaita frowned. "But this is only half of it. We need the rest to cure Ring and all the other Navis." Worry finally crept onto his face. He'd done his best to hold it back during his Navi's fight, but things were starting to look even bleaker. "I'm sorry for asking so much of you, but..."

"It's nothing!" Turboman answered as brightly as he could. In a more serious tone, he continued, "They're my friends, and I'll do whatever I can to help them. I'll catch up to Geminiman in no time!"

Kaita nodded his agreement, though it didn't make him feel any better. "Okay."

* * *

"Meteoric Burst!"

Roll simply held up her hand, letting the Dream Aura chip she'd just gotten take the hit for her. "Wide Shot!" she called next, bringing her arm up to fire at Geminiman.

His body was already leaking data from the arms and chest, rendering him too tired to dodge. He staggered back as the burst hit him in the gut, tearing open a new hole. Then, a purplish ribbon streaked through the air toward him. When it was absorbed by the blue-and-purple Navi, Roll knew that it had to be trouble. A white light surrounded him for a moment before leaving him with both his own facial marking and that of his twin. "You and Rookie Racer are toast," Geminiman laughed, bringing up one cannon to fire. "Gemini Laser!" A white light began to gather inside the buster. Roll saw the red Navi that had to be who Geminiman was referring to running up the street. They exchanged glances moments before the light flashed outward, blinding them both.

It seemed like the world had just exploded around her. The attack seemed to slam into her from every direction; when it cleared, she heard the other Navi land with a metallic clunk. Though she couldn't hold back a wince as she got to her feet, the damage wasn't enough to keep her down, especially after Meiru used a healing chip. The other Navi was obviously civilian, groaning where he lay sprawled on the ground.

"I'm Roll, one of the Net Saviors," she introduced once she'd helped him to his feet. "Are you all right?"

"I'm okay, I think," he said. "My name's Turboman. I'm really sorry about all this."

"Unless we're missing a large part of the story, I don't think this is your fault," Meiru said, appearing on a screen above her Navi's head. "Here's a Recovery for him, Roll." The chip data materialized in front of the pink-clad Navi.

As she held it out to him, Roll looked him up and down curiously. "You don't seem to be affected by the virus. Do you have an anti-virus program equipped, too?"

Turboman took the Recovery, sighing as the damage from his previous battle disappered. "No. I don't know why I'm not affected. We're thinking it's because... Well..." From the silence, Roll had to guess that Turboman's Operator was just as ashamed as his Navi.

"May I speak to your Operator, Turboman?" Meiru asked next. "By the way, my name's Sakurai Meiru. You are...?"

It didn't take long for her to get a response. "Um, hello," Kaita said, his PET's screen popping up at the same level as Meiru's. "I'm Todoroki Kaita, and..." He and Turboman exchanged a look before he continued, "It really is our fault, Sakurai-san. See, this guy named Black was in this warehouse, and I think he knew about me-he said something about the orienteering thing. Anyway, he stole this girl's purse, and..."

Before he could descend into all-out rambling, Meiru stopped him. "Whoa, hold on! So, this man knew about you from...?"

"He was with Nova," began Kaita, to which Meiru nodded. "I think I've run into their members before-I didn't go looking for them, they came to me," he hurriedly explained before Roll could assume he'd foolishly gone after them. "And their Netbattling really wasn't that good, either. So, I was talking with this lady who I didn't know, and he stole the purse."

"She was a stranger? She just walked up to you and started talking?" Meiru asked. Kaita nodded, leaving the brown-eyed Net Savior to conclude, "I think she might have been planted there, if you're right about Black coming after you."

"I knew she sounded familiar," muttered Turboman. To Roll, he asked, "They can just keep talking while we go after Geminiman, right?"

Roll was hesitant. "Yes... But you're a civilian Navi. You shouldn't come with us-if Geminiman's going to be using an attack like that last one, it could get pretty bad."

"I do want to hear the rest of Kaita-kun's story," Meiru told Roll. "Turboman can plug out after he's done." To Kaita, she said, "Please continue."

Kaita didn't seem completely happy, but for now, Meiru was waiting for him to continue. "He had an uncustomized Navi, and Turboman beat that easily. But then he sent down a bunch of viruses, and there were some we couldn't beat... and we got frustrated. He put this dark ball in front of Turboman, and he hit it, and... that's where this sickness came from. We let it out." The look that Meiru was regarding him with wasn't a pleased one, but it wasn't especially angry, either; Kaita continued, "We didn't know. We just want to fix this, and that'll happen when Geminiman's beaten... so can we please help?" Kaita looked truly repentant as he looked through his PET screen, waiting for Meiru's verdict.

There was a moment where the only sounds were the Navis' footsteps. Finally, Meiru's expression softened. "I wish Enzan were here," she sighed. "He's so much better at saying no than I am..."

Kaita's expression brightened as Turboman said, "We can help?"

"Against my better judgement, yes," Meiru said. She turned to type something into a nearby computer; seconds later, a message popped up on Kaita's screen. "It'll only last until midnight, but you can use your Battlechips in Internet City now."

"Really? Thank you, Sakurai-san!"

"Please, call me Meiru. Now, let's catch that Navi!"

* * *

Geminiman frowned as he dashed along the road.

_They're probably going to be on us in a little while,_ the non-solid half of them thought. His distinct seperation from the other Geminiman was beginning to fade; it wouldn't be long now before this last bit merged fully with him. _There're only so many places to run to in Internet City. You know, not exactly the size of the Internet proper and all._

"And that Net Savior's probably got the know-how to trace cure half number two after she's gotten that kid's Navi to hand over his half," Geminiman pointed out.

_Well, if that's crystal clear, how much longer are you going to keep running?_ It was becoming harder and harder for Geminiman to 'hear' his other half as he continued, _Not like a Navi like us has to bother with someone like her, but, you know, just in case... It was fun, Geminiman. _

"Stop being a pessimist and rest," snapped the blue-and-purple Navi. "That whole mess was a fluke. Now that we're merged, I can beat that little girl easily."

A weak laugh floated through their mind. _You always brag..._ And with that parting shot, the weakened Geminiman faded completely.

"Yeah, well, so do you." Footsteps sounded behind him, growing louder and louder; Geminiman knew that there was nothing for it but turning to face their source.

* * *

As Turboman and Roll caught up to Geminiman, he turned to face them. "You actually brought Rookie Racer along? Man, you are _desperate_," he laughed.

Roll shot back, "You're one to talk-running when we've got Internet City blocked off? Not to mention how I almost beat you, and Turboman here actually finished the job."

"Oh, that doesn't matter now. See, my creator came up with a little something that I personally think is genius-when your buddy there forced my other half back into me, whatever hit points he had left came back as well. I'm all patched up now, and it's thanks to him!" Raising his buster, he sneered, "Of course, you've seen my new attack already. It doesn't matter how many Navis go up against me. I'm just too good to lose now! Gemini Laser!"

Kaita cringed as the flash slammed into both Navis. "Get him before he attacks again, Turboman! Mega Cannon, slot in!"

Geminiman leapt away from the blast with ease, doing a midair flip and landing a few feet behind him. Moments later, his buster was fully charged. "Gemini Laser!" Both Turboman and Roll were forced to the ground. The power of their foe's attacks was taking its toll on both of them; getting to their feet was more of a struggle after every hit. While Kaita was beginning to look panicked, Meiru was drawing out a Battlechip in preparation for the next attack. As Geminiman triumphantly shouted, "Gemini Laser!" she slotted the Battlechip in. The beam of light was only partially formed when a giant Metool helmet dropped over Roll and Turboman; as the latter got to his feet, he could hear Geminiman's cry of surprise and pain.

"Reflector," Meiru said with a grin. "And I've got plenty more where that came from..."

Geminiman opened his mouth to answer, but had the wind knocked out of him by another Mega Cannon from Turboman. "Playing hardball, are we?" he panted. "Meteoric Burst!"

"Turboman, to the right!" Following Roll's advice, the red Navi sprinted to the side with all the speed he could muster; the golden energy was barely on its way down when he was standing directly to the left of his enemy. To her surprise, Roll found herself arriving on the opposite side seconds after the other Navi.

"Why'd you do that? Reflector only summons _one_ shield, and I'm fully charged now. If you use it now, Rookie Racer over there'll get double the damage. Gemini Laser!"

Meiru grinned. "A friend of mine told me that an eleven-year-old won a ton of Battlechips recently. I think the chances of Reflector being one of them are pretty high, don't you, Kaita-kun?" she asked as the yellow hard hat dropped over her Navi. Kaita wasted no time in digging out the right Battlechip and delivering its protection to Turboman. The Navi had barely felt any of the blinding attack's heat before he was also safe under a Metool helmet. When the two Reflectors had vanished, Geminiman was barely standing, his purple-and-blue armor many shades darker.

"I can't believe this... you're smarter than I'd expected," wheezed Geminiman as he fell to the ground. "But you'll never catch up... Arrow's... in the World Three Area..." Roll gasped. Meiru looked equally horrified. Geminiman's body morphed into the word 'DELETE' and vanished in a flurry of pixels, leaving the second half of the cure behind, but Kaita and Turboman were the only ones who were paying attention to that.

Meiru and her Navi exchanged worried looks. "I'm calling Meijin-san. Roll, take the cure and head for the World Three Area. You can send it to the Ministry of Science later. And as for you two..." Meiru's normally friendly features cast a sterner look toward Turboman and his Operator. "I know that having to sit and wait while other people play the hero is frustrating. I've been there, and I know you mean well. But running into the World Three Area unprepared will get you nothing but trouble, and I can't be constantly watching over you. Kaita-kun, plug out and leave this to me." Her window vanished. Roll plucked one half of the white ball of light from the ground and turned toward Turboman, who reluctantly gave her the half he was carrying.

"Thank you for your help," she said with a small smile. Then, she was off. Turboman, still panting from the previous fight, was left watching her as she dashed down the main road.

As she turned a corner and went out of sight, Kaita said, "Follow her." Turboman looked up at his Operator in surprise. "It's not over yet, right? Nova must be doing something bad if Meiru-san and Roll were so worried about it, and Arrow's a lot weaker than you are. This'll turn out just fine."

"I was hoping you'd say that!" Turboman was already in pursuit; Roll was back in his sights just as she stepped onto a warp panel and disappeared. After giving the pink-clad Navi a few seconds so that she wouldn't notice him, he stepped onto the panel as well, Internet City fading around him before being replaced by one of the blue tunnels of the regular Internet. Ahead of him, the tunnel stopped in what appeared to be a metal door, which swung open as Roll flew toward it. As she disappeared into it, Turboman kicked his legs to go faster; he had a feeling that the door wouldn't admit him. It nearly closed on his feet as he twisted around it and into the blackness of the area that it led to. The simulated gravity's sudden hold on him nearly caused him to land with a crash and betray his position to the Navi ahead of him. Fortunately, he managed to land just softly enough so that Roll, the bright colors of her bodysuit fading as she went deeper into the darkness, didn't notice him.

"They both seemed really worried," Kaita said, observing the gloom through his screen. "I wonder what's in there?"

Turboman ran on, a look of concentration on his face. "I guess we're about to find out."

* * *

"Black!"

He turned from the multiple computers of their hideout's system with a hint of surprise; he'd forgotten that Teruo was staying at the base. With Yumi busy, she couldn't take him home, and they'd been careful to ensure that he couldn't find his way to and from the base on his own. "Yes, Teruo?" Next to him, Yumi turned her head for a second to take in the boy's scowl before returning to what she was doing.

"You knew about this virus all along, didn't you?" he began before noticing Arrow on the monitors. The green-clad Navi was fending off a Dream Bit, a laser blast whistling past her before she deleted its source with a Mega Cannon. "And what's she doing? Why don't you tell me stuff? Tell me _right now!_" Teruo whined, stamping his foot in frustration.

Black's smile was insincere, but polite. "If you'll just plug your PET into the terminal to your left, I'll cure your Navi of my plague and repair any damage done to him. My fix will be permanent, so afterwards, you can le-" But Yumi tapped his shoulder before he could reply; he frowned at her for a moment before the smile returned to his face. "No. You're right, I have been leaving you out of our plans for too long. Plug Sparkman in, and I'll explain."

Teruo hesitated for a moment, but a sudden cry from his PET pushed him into action. "All right, fine, that'll work as an apology, I guess," he muttered. Black wheeled his chair over to the other computer and right-clicked on Sparkman's hunched-over form. After breezing through a few menus that Teruo hadn't even known existed, Black brought up a window-this, Teruo could recognize as being important to Sparkman's well-being-and started typing.

"Okay, here's the deal," he began, ignoring Teruo's alarm as he deleted a whole section of Sparkman's code and started to replace it. "We're on the hunt for some valuable research files that we can use to our ends. With them, we'll be able to augment some programs we've got lying around-and before you ask, yes, that does include Navis." Black's legs were crossed under the chair, but Teruo either didn't notice or missed the significance. "Yumi can direct Sparkman to the World Three Area, and it shouldn't take you long to catch up with Arrow. She'll be able to keep you two safe from the worst of it," he explained, ignoring the glare his female partner shot in his direction. He stood up and headed for the door.

"Hey!" protested Teruo, moving to block Black's path. "What about Sparkman?"

"Already repaired. Anyway, I've got a meeting with the boss right now, and I'd rather not be late," the brown-haired hacker said, looking at the time on his empty PET for emphasis. "Move it." Shooting Black an annoyed look as he did so, Teruo obliged. The hacker walked out of the room and toward his leader's office, just in case the obnoxious twerp followed.

"You're early," was the first thing that the man behind the chair noticed.

"You can thank Joumon," Black said, his irritation showing even more than it had before. "Man, I can't wait for him to get his..."

The leader took a sip from his wineglass before telling his employee, "I caught his Navi snooping; he knows about the Devil. He hasn't told Joumon, though. Indeed, he doesn't seem to even know what it's for, but if he ever puts two and two together..."

Black sighed, "Another crappy Navi? You underestimate me. A few strong Wood viruses, and Sparky'll be junk data."

"But that has no finesse. You can't possibly enjoy just _watching_ him get torn apart. Besides, it takes talent to make a standard Navi beat a custom job. I respect that. This is far more permanent than what I've previously given you."

The boss set his wineglass atop his desk before taking a small key out of his pocket. He inserted it into the largest drawer in his desk and opened it. Black grinned, knowing what was inside the locked drawer. "About time!" At least ten PETs, old and new models alike, were sitting inside, turned off. A red-and-black PET Advance was what the boss selected. After wiping the thick film of dust off the device with his purple sleeve, he placed it a few inches to the right of where he sat.

"Meet Punk."


	9. Level Up

The Ura Net's noise-absorbing blackness was bad enough. Turboman's footsteps seemed loud as gunshots to him. The shimmering blobs of data and decaying programs were soundless, fluttering through the space above him. Would one of them suddenly drop down and attack? Would something else come out of the darkness to swallow him whole first? Seeing the warp panel that had to lead to the WWW Area was a relief, even with the two busts-both of the same balding man with the same piercing, one-eyed gaze-staring down at him from either side.

The first impression he got as the blue light of the warp dissipated was that the WWW Area was much, much worse. The noises started seconds after Turboman's entrance into the dark-somehow even darker than the Ura Net-area. They sounded as if they were all around him: scuffles, what he tried to tell himself was the sound of his own feet, other noises that almost sounded like strange, distant laughter. He couldn't tell what was in his head and what was really out there. That, he realized as he was sent crashing to the ground, was proving to be a serious liability. Turboman rolled to the side, avoiding the next attack. He saw gunfire explode against the ground as he looked over to see a short, spiny virus: a Dream Bit.

"Battlechip: Yo-yo! Slot-in!" Turboman's arm changed into the silver holster, but he didn't dare release the red yo-yo inside. He'd lost track of where the Dream Bit was, and the noise-the laughter, louder than before-was covering the virus's sounds. His head turned frantically from one side to another, but there seemed to be nothing on the ground. Above him, it seemed like he was surrounded by the red, floating skulls that gave out the only light in the area, their jaws moving up and down as if silently cackling. Gunfire from the side; Turboman pulled his legs up to his chest and sent out the Yo-yo, shredding the Dream Bit. Before anything else could come up to him, he got to his feet and started running, no longer caring if Roll heard him or not.

No sooner had he started wondering when something else would go wrong than Kaita's voice called out, "Turboman, behind you! Cannon, slot-in!" Turboman whirled around and sent out his Turbo Wheel attack, sending one Dream Bit skidding backward to be hit by Kaita's Cannon fire. The second paused for a moment, before sending out a ball of lightning that whipped toward Turboman faster than he'd expected. He could feel it crackling dangerously close to him as he barely managed to sidestep. He cried out in surprise as he was sent flying backward; the Dream Bit had destroyed Kaita's Cannon turret, then started firing on him. A Vulcan formed on Turboman's arm, and he wasted no time in finishing the Dream Bit off.

"Let's hurry up and find Roll, Turboman," Kaita said, worried.

"Don't have to tell me twice," Turboman replied, dashing on into the darkness.

* * *

Unfortunately for both him and his Operator, Turboman was not the last one to access the warp to the WWW Area.

"Someone's been through here in the past few minutes. Otherwise, they would be three times this number," Black informed Punk. The Navi had found himself facing eight of the Dream Bits in no time at all.

"Would that really be all that challenging? Double-Go-Round!" Punk easily leapt away from the green bugs' attack before snatching the spiky plates from his shoulders and hurling them at the viruses, ripping through them with ease.

Black's grin was genuine as he noted, "So, you've got the bite to back up your bark! I like it!"

"Thanks, sir," Punk said gruffly.

"None of that," his new Operator quickly corrected. "Black. Just Black."

Punk found it a pleasant surprise. "'Right, then." He broke into a run, asking, "Since y'seem to know so much about this place, what should I be looking out for?"

"Right now? Just the guy who got through here before us," said Black. "Both of our group's Navis are already working on getting through to the center. Though I would've thought Roll would be a lot further in by now."

"Roll? Th' Net Savior?"

"You've heard of her?"

"Not outside you guys' building, no. A little after my time," Punk replied. Noticing someone further ahead, he added, "Though I'd guess she isn't red?"

"Pink. Keep going..." As Punk approached, the tall figure ahead became clearer and more carlike. "Him again. I should react with surprise, but I wouldn't expect anything else from him."

"'Again'? This guy some enemy of yours, or what?"

"Don't call him that. It makes him sound like he knows what he's doing." Black's lips twitched upward in amusement. "But it's not good to have so many Navis cluttering up the place-it might get us all into trouble. Now, why don't I take you on a proper road test?"

* * *

"Vulcan!" Three of the Dream Bits disappeared under the smoke, leaving seven others to shoot down Turboman. A grunt of pain escaped him as he fell to the ground. "Kaita-kun... I'm not sure how much longer I have 'till I crash and burn..." he said weakly.

From behind him, a loud voice said, "It's kinda late to consider bowin' out now, isn't it?" A thick cable with a spiky, cylindrical mace on its end shot ahead of Turboman, skewering the remaining Dream Bits.

As the viruses disappeared, Turboman got out of the dangerous-looking weapon's path and turned to find that it was actually his savior's left arm. His right was more normal-looking, having a normal hand and red-armored forearm. It was only this arm and his legs that gave him a vaguely human form. His body and head were attached in one giant ball, with no nose or mouth. His red eyes, each framed by rust-red spikes that almost resembled a mask, only looked more intimidating for it. "Uh-um... Thank you," he said, getting to his feet. "You are...?"

"Name's Punk, but I don't see what you're thankin' me for." The two large, circular plates sitting on his shoulders suddenly popped off, the white spikes that adorned either one flashing red in the light of the skulls. As he leapt in the air, plates closing around his body, he yelled, "Mad Roller!"

Kaita's frantically shouted "Area Steal!" came just in time; the spiky ball that was Punk plowed through where Turboman had been milliseconds before. The spiky Navi seemed to realize that staying in the attack was futile; as Turboman reappeared above him, his shoulder plates popped into the air as he emerged from within them.

"Double-Go-Round!" He caught the two discs and hurled them skywards, where his opponent found them difficult to evade. One disc caught Turboman on the side, turning his landing into a fall.

Kaita watched in shock as his Navi slammed into the ground, rooted to the spot with panic. "Turboman!" Punk's arm was already hurtling forward. Kaita frantically fished a chip out of his pocket and slammed it into his PET, not even bothering to see what it was.

It was hard to tell whether Turboman's yelp was from surprise at receiving a Battlechip or alarm at the spiky mace that was inches from him. "Flame Tower!" he shouted, slamming a fist into the ground just in time. Punk's arm was caught in the blaze, and he stopped his attacks to get out of the blazing pillar's path. Oddly enough, he didn't seem to feel any pain from the attack, though his arm was badly singed.

"Get him while he's moving! Corn Shot!" There was mean-spirited amusement in Punk's eyes as Turboman opened fire. He popped off the disc on his left shoulder, holding it in front of the incoming kernels. The other disc came off as soon as the attack had stopped, closing around Punk's body.

"Mad Roller!" Turboman was sent flying as Punk smashed into him. The spiky ball turned and flew forward to meet its victim, but Punk seemed to think better of it. He stopped in front of the other Navi, laughing as Turboman got to his hands and knees. "It's sad, ya know. Just sad-" the toe of an oversized boot dug into Turboman's gut before propelling him into the air. Punk wasted no time in going into a handstand, his legs catching his victim on either side of the throat and smashing him into the ground face-first "-how any little kid these days thinks he can mess with organized criminals. Criminals who have _years_'a experience on 'im." Turboman couldn't find the strength to get up, or even to say something to Kaita, whose screams of his name seemed far away now. Punk's footsteps were coming slowly closer, and there was a nearly unnoticeable _whirr_ as his left arm snaked in the air. "Ya may be better than the others in your sandbox, but it's a big ol' desert out here. And there're many, many people who're better than you-oh, before I forget..." With a single, loud laugh, Punk rammed his mace arm downward. The attack easily pierced Turboman's right arm, forcing a scream from him.

"Turboman! I can't-_Turboman!_" Kaita's eyes were wide with panic and fright as he hit the recall button on his PET. No matter how many times he tried, nothing seemed to happen. "Why can't I plug out?"

Punk's eyes narrowed, cruelly smug. "I told ya before, it's too late to go cryin' home. The World Three Area has a special kind of security, see. You can stroll right in, but panic and plug out? Impossible." Punk's left arm zoomed downward, stabbing Turboman's injured arm again and again as he said, "Ya left the only way out behind a while ago, car-boy. So there's nothin' left that you can do but _die_." There was nothing left but a mangled mess, the crumpled, hole-filled remains of Turboman's forearm barely attached to his shoulder. Punk retracted his left arm, turning to look at Kaita. Over his victim's screams, he continued, "Oh, and don't worry, kid." The arm plunged downward again, this time heading for Turboman's other arm. "I'll make sure you remember this for as long as you live." Kaita felt hot tears prickle behind his eyes. His vision went blurry as a swift attack severed Turboman's left arm from the elbow down, and the screams grew louder and hoarser. Seconds later, an indistinct blue flash lit up the screen. People were talking, a girl's voice was yelling; it didn't matter, he'd still failed his Navi...

"Kaita-kun! Kaita-kun!"

"Kaita-kun, I'm okay now!"

"T-Turboman?" Kaita wiped the tears away with a sleeve. His Navi was sitting up, a familiar pink figure at work healing his wounds. "You're okay!"

"No thanks to you," snapped Meiru, and Kaita felt his happiness disappear. "I told you to leave this to me and Roll! If we hadn't heard your Navi and that other one, he would've been deleted!"

"Punk!" Kaita realized. "What happened to him?"

"Roll used this huge gun on him," Turboman explained. "He tried to get out of the way, but it still completely wiped away that arm of his. I think it scared him off."

"Giga Cannon," Roll clarified. "Meiru-chan, I can't heal Turboman's arm completely. Could you-?"

"Of course," said Meiru in a kindlier tone. Then, her focus returned to the problem of Turboman as she slotted in a Recovery. "We've already wasted too much time. There's no way we can escort you back out. But you're too weak to make it out by yourself..." She scowled. "I don't like where this is going."

Kaita wasn't liking it, either.

* * *

**A/N:**(I normally don't post author's notes on ffn, since nobody's going to care about most of them in a few years' time. (While I'm here: thank you to my reviewers so far! I appreciate your taking the time to leave a comment, and I'm glad you like it!) But I couldn't resist this one from the dA posting:

YOU'RE A MEAN ONE, MR. PUNK

YOUR HEART'S AN EMPTY HOOOOOLE!

YOUR DATA'S FULL OF SPIDERS,

YOU'VE GOT GARLIC IN YOUR SOUL

MR. PU-UNK!

I WOULDN'T TOUCH YOU WITH A-

THIRTY-NINE-AND-A-HALF FOOT POOOOOOLE!)


	10. Into the Nucleus

It was nearing midnight as Turboman and Roll dashed on through the darkness. Fending off the Dream Bits was Roll's duty at the moment. Turboman was mostly just doing his best to stay out of the Net Savior's way. After the chewing out they'd gotten once Meiru had realized that Turboman had to come along, both he and Kaita had resolved to never stick their noses in places where they didn't belong ever again (or, at least, not when Meiru was involved). After Meiru had learned that Kaita had been commandeering the cash register at an electronics store all afternoon, she had told him to go home and take a quick nap. She herself was sipping a cup of coffee between Battlechips, though long enough pauses were few in number. Roll didn't seem to be having much of a problem by herself-as soon as more viruses showed up, another Battlechip worked its magic on them, clearing them out with ease. Turboman used his attack only when he knew he had a clear shot, thinking that Meiru would almost certainly leave him to the WWW Area's whims if Roll got hit with friendly fire. He might not have been much help even if he was needed. His mind was still on his disastrous encounter with Black and his Navi, still wishing he could've found a way to turn the fight around.

"Kanketsusen!" yelled Roll, and the next swarm of Dream Bits vanished under a wall of water.

The further onward he and Roll went, the more determined Turboman became to make it so Black and Punk were the ones who didn't know what hit them. He was certain he and Kaita could figure it out somehow; it was just a matter of doing it.

* * *

Mary couldn't have slept if she'd wanted to. Ring's normally energetic body was limp inside the PET, small whimpers coming from the speakers. Around her, other worried Operators were packing the lower level of the Ministry of Science's lobby. Even with its high ceiling, being inside was still a pretty claustrophobic experience. Hundreds of people-everyone whose Navis had been in Internet City when the virus had hit, she had to guess-were talking loudly and trying to peer over others' heads. She was in the front, having arrived sooner than most of the others there, but that had just meant that the wait was longer. The Ministry's computers were in a secure system, but they weren't taking any chances with the virus; the scientists were apparently setting up special areas for the sick Navis. Mary only hoped that it wouldn't take much longer.

"Everyone!" A woman had just walked out of the double doors at the front of the lobby. "Thank you for your patience. We can take twenty Navis at the moment-the first row of people here." Mary almost laughed in her relief as four more scientists came to escort them into the laboratory and to keep away the frustrated Operators who hadn't made it. Once they were inside, they found even more men in white coats waiting. "You'll all be led to separate areas in the facility, where our top scientists will do what they can."

"Don't worry, Ring," she whispered to the now-silent Navi. "I'm sure they'll figure out something..."

The scientist who was leading her to one of the offices stopped at the door to give her a reassuring smile. "You're very lucky, you know! If anyone can fix your Navi, this man will." He knocked on the door. "Hikari-hakase?"

"Come in." A brown-haired, bearded man in a lab coat turned from one of the three computers that dotted his office to meet Mary and her guide. Hikari-hakase's concern was evident in his brown eyes as they met Mary's green ones. "Please hand me your PET." Once she'd followed his direction, walking past a more cluttered desk to stand next to Hikari-hakase at his main one, he looked down at the display and frowned. "Now, let me see what I can do." Hikari-hakase plugged Ring into his computer.

His Navi, a friendly-looking, boyish one clad in blue, caught her in his arms before she could topple to the ground. He placed a hand on her Navi symbol, frowning as data ran down his eyes. "You were right, Papa. It's designed to travel through the 'blank' data around us."

Mary looked from scientist to Navis in confusion. "'Blank data'?"

"Air-or the Internet's equivalent of it." Hikari-hakase frowned. "Most people don't bother to learn what it is, much less find ways to manipulate it. Someone's been doing their research." He turned his attention back to the screen. "Continue analyzing, Rockman."

The blue-clad Navi nodded, and data was soon zipping through his green eyes again. "The virus itself... Most of these physical symptoms are cosmetic. What it's really doing is embedding itself into her core files."

Hikari-hakase completed his Navi's suspicion with, "And when it's finished, she'll be deleted." He typed a command into the computer. Ring vanished for a moment to reappear in the air above Rockman, two blue rings lazily floating around her. A window displaying her status appeared on the screen, with a bar across the top that had to be Ring's hit points. Mary didn't find it very reassuring-the hit point bar was slowly dropping every moment. "Hm... I see..." The scientist turned to give a reassuring smile to Mary, explaining, "It's only the method that it's using to get around that's unique here-I've seen programs similar to this before. I should be able to halt the damage."

"Really? Thank goodness," sighed Mary. Hikari-hakase turned back to the computer and started typing. Moments later, the status window's readout stopped changing.

A message appeared in front of Rockman. He read it quickly, then looked over to his creator. "They're having trouble out in the lobby. If this works, could you send something like it for the people waiting?"

"Possibly." But then the readout began to drop again, slowly at first, then picking up speed as Mary gasped and Hikari-hakase's fingers raced across the keyboard. It still didn't manage to go far before it was halted again. "It tried to go around that first command I gave it," he explained to Mary, who was still eyeing the status window with concern. "In a very simple way, fortunately, so it was easy to stop." He brought up another window and typed in a few lines of code. "This patch should halt the damage. Rockman, could you...?"

"Of course, Papa." The window became a data file, which Rockman grabbed before heading for the exit. With that settled, Hikari-hakase turned his attention back to Ring.

"That should've been the last of its struggles-now, let's see if we can reverse this..."

* * *

"We're here." Meiru looked a little nervous as she said it-and with Nova's Navis ahead of them, Turboman felt the same way. Her window closed for a moment. Turboman guessed that she was calling Kaita's PET, and he was proven right; his Operator appeared moments later, yawning.

"You ready, Turboman?" Kaita asked, managing to hide most of his nerves.

Neither Operator nor Navi was looking forward to this, and both of them knew it. Still, Turboman answered, "Yep. Let's get this over with." Roll nodded in agreement before dashing toward the green-lit panel that would transport them into the deepest part of the WWW Area. Turboman followed, watching the blonde Net Savior teleport away in a burst of light seconds before he did the same.

What he saw on the other side would have left him amazed in any other place, but here it only served to intimidate him. Stretching miles and miles up into the gloom were millions of files, barely giving off light after so many years, stacked in ornate bookshelves that served as the long corridor's walls. There were thick chunks of the slim, blue folders missing from some of the shelves. Arrow and her fellow Nova Navis were probably the ones to blame.

Roll, too, was looking around at her surroundings with a mixture of wonder and apprehension. "So, Commissioner Kifune's theory was right... this must really be his life's work."

"The last of Wily's power, all in this room," Meiru said. "And Nova's already gotten their hands on some of it..."

Turboman swallowed nervously as he peered around the room. In the back, the shelves curved to form a huge, circular room; there was a bright pinprick of blue light near the back, probably an access window of some kind. And standing in front of that window was a figure in rust-red armor...

Roll had noticed him, too. "That Navi from before!"

They ran to meet him before any more damage could be done. The spike-covered Navi turned to face them as Black's voice came out of the darkness to command, "Do your worst, Punk." The Navi jumped into the air the moment Black finished talking, shoulder plates clamping down around him before he barreled at Roll and Turboman. The two Navis leapt away in opposite directions, forcing Punk to choose a target. Instead of doing that, he simply popped out of his Mad Roller attack to send his mace at Roll while a Vulcan materialized on his other arm. Turboman got ready to dodge while Roll dove under the spiky cylinder and its attached cable, but Punk's attention was fixed squarely on Roll. She threw herself away from the bullets, but her enemy's arm was waiting. She cried out as it wrapped around her.

"Flame Sword, slot-in!" Turboman practically flung himself at the line of cable that extended between Punk and Roll's entwined body, bringing his sword down on it with a yell. But even as it gave way and the wire around Roll slackened, he felt the pain of a Mega Cannon's fire hit him exactly at the waist. Before he could give much thought to the question of why Punk had sacrificed his arm for that shot, he hit the ground with a loud thud.

When he'd recovered, Punk was examining what remained of his left arm with an over-the-top, mournful sigh. "Ow." This sadness didn't seem to impede him that much. He managed to dodge a Rabi Ring from Roll with the same dejected, almost tearful expression on his face, and it was only when he realized that the attack had been meant to distract him from Turboman's-and the Flame Sword that was still on his hand's-approach that he abruptly snapped back into his usual demeanor. He whipped off his left shoulder plate for use as a shield, blocking Turboman's blow before sending his defense barreling into the car-like Navi's body. There was no room to dodge Punk's attack, but at least no follow-up attacks came at Turboman. Roll had chosen that moment to get her revenge with a well-placed Roll Arrow, elicting a wince from Punk as it hit. She dashed toward the spiky Navi, suddenly drawing close with the aid of an Area Steal; Punk sent his remaining shoulder plate at her while the other one snapped back into place, but the antennae on her head held it at bay for a few moments before finally hurling it aside.

"Samurai Sword!" Punk threw up his severed arm, seemingly in defense. It didn't hold up to Roll's slash, the remaining piece of it forced downward as the Samurai Sword began to cut into Punk's spherical torso. However, the attack stopped there. There was more of Punk's arm left than what either of his opponents had thought, and he sent it twining around Roll's leg before yanking it up, sending the ensnared Navi crashing to the ground.

Kaita bit his lip. If his next tactic backfired, he and Meiru would be doing even worse than they were at the moment-but Punk was drawing Roll back up for another knock against the hard floor, pausing only to send his shoulder plates flying toward Turboman. "Meiru-san, Roll, watch out! Flame Tower, slot-in!"

There was barely a moment's pause before Turboman slammed his fist down and Meiru reacted. "Sword, slot-in!" Roll swiped at the cable around her leg, ignoring the shallow cuts made to her bubblegum-pink boot in favor of getting away from Punk, who was determined to take the pink-clad Navi with him when the Flame Tower struck. The pillar of lava had already blocked the Double-Go-Round intended for Turboman without erring from its course. "Dream Aura!" yelled Meiru triumphantly, watching as Punk's arm bounced against her Navi's shield.

Turboman hadn't been more than a few feet away from Punk and Roll when he'd fired the Flame Tower, and Punk was left feeling the heat of the incoming attack with no real options in the way of dodging. "_Shit!_"

"No problem! Reflector, slot-in!" Turboman recognized the chip from mere hours earlier. His eyes widened behind his visor as he realized what was about to happen. He flung himself to one side, but not in time. The jet of lava flying at him clipped him on the shoulder. While he recovered, Roll leapt in his direction to cover him, shooting a Vulcan at Punk. The red Navi seemed to have noticed something; seconds later, Black called, "Heat Cross!" Punk quickly fired, the shot missing both Roll and Turboman.

"Are you blind?" Roll taunted, a Wide Shot forming on her arm. "Why don't I show you h-" The rest was lost in a shriek of surprise as an explosion ripped out from behind her and Turboman, knocking them both to the ground.

"'-how ta aim', right? I _was_ aimin'-at the Ratton Hanabi behind you, that is." Turboman got to his knees, looking behind him to see what could've produced the bomb; but there was nothing back there. Meanwhile, a more pressing problem was attracting his attention: Punk was heading for him. "Anyway..." The cable looped around Turboman's hurt shoulder, and he screamed in pain as Punk tugged him upright. The spiky Navi noted, "Now, this is givin' me deja vu. Same for you, I'd expect..."

"Then this should feel the same way," said Meiru, three Battlechips ready and waiting in her hand. "Cannon, triple slot-in!"

Two Cannons formed on Roll's arms, and she brought them up to morph into a large, blue weapon. "Get out of there, Turboman!" Kaita was already on it; an Area Steal tore his Navi from Punk's grip, though his shoulder was slowly leaking data. "Giga Cannon!"

"YES!" Turboman couldn't help but cheer; he'd reappeared just in time to see a huge burst of golden light fly out of Roll's cannon and engulf Punk's figure completely. When it died away, the red Navi was nowhere to be seen.

"Not bad, children, not bad." Kaita recognized the condescending tone instantly. Black proceeded to give him a face to go with the voice; he was pale and thin, with scruffy brown hair hanging down around his face. One of his eyes was missing, replaced by a circular piece of blue glass rimmed with metal. A smile tugged at his lips, but his single brown eye was cold.

Kaita thought he was every bit as frightening as Punk. But even as he took in Black's features, Meiru said, "Don't let him intimidate you, Kaita-kun. After all, he's the one who lost to us 'children'." It may have sounded like it was meant for Kaita, but her glare was fixed squarely on Black.

"Yes, maybe to _you_!" laughed the brunette. "But carboy here... well, can't say the same for him. And the difference wasn't even in brainpower, really-nope, it was all in the flashy parlor tricks. See, anyone can win with a Giga Cannon, Meiru_-chan_," he explained, the suffix less of a pet name and more of a sneered, mocking insult in his hands. "That ain't strategy. A Netbattler who can think has no need for cheap attacks like that. Shame you're not one of them."

"Why don't you shut up before you dig yourself any deeper?" Meiru shot back. "I don't think you have any right to complain-we sure seem to have outfoxed you!"

Black just gave her a patronizing smile, which only served to infuriate her further. "Oh, I wouldn't say that." Roll yelped as an invisible force came down on her shoulder. She looked down to see Punk's black-gloved hand materialize there. "You see, there are these two chips I really like-they're called Kawarimi and Invisible. I could've given you two one nasty surprise if I'd wanted to continue, not to mention one other thing..."

"Me," finished Arrow, appearing next to Punk. "Except my invisibility's built in. But let's not waste time on that... I can't be the only one who's heard tales about the security around here, can I?"


	11. Final Battle: Dream Virus!

"Security?" wondered Turboman.

Arrow, Punk, and Roll suddenly frowned at something he'd managed to miss. The three Navis stood frozen for a moment before Roll said quietly, "I hope that isn't what I think it is." Turboman looked around, clueless.

"Well, we all knew it was comin' from the moment we started knockin' each other around," was Punk's reply. Turboman still couldn't feel anything-there might've been some little buzzing at his feet while the others looked at the ground for a longer moment, but it could just as easily have been his imagination. "Think we should round up Sparkman, or will he jus' get in the way?"

"I'm already working on removing Wily's block on plugging out," Black said, no jeers and all business. "He can-" There was definitely a small rumble now. Having never felt anything like it before, Turboman was startled. Black typed something in and waited for a second; the result made his frown grow deeper. "You've only got a minute or so, maybe less. Get ready." Everyone, even Roll and Meiru, heeded his warning.

Turboman walked closer to Roll; speaking low enough for Punk and Arrow to not hear, he asked, "What's coming?" He was just in time; any later, and he would've been cut off by a larger tremor that caused him to stumble.

"Wily being Wily, some kind of Navi or virus," Roll replied. "He was-maybe even _is_-a programming genius. I've heard that Navis have made it here only to never come out... Whatever it is, it's going to be tough." To Turboman's surprise, neither she nor Meiru asked him to leave with Sparkman (since he was apparently here somewhere). He couldn't help but wonder whether it was faith, taking a chance, or if they had simply forgotten.

There was one more enormous tremor that knocked everyone to their feet; then, a familiar scream pierced the air. Turboman turned to see Sparkman fade into view, rammed against the wall by a thin, white beam of concentrated energy. A green virus, the largest Turboman had ever seen, followed the electric Navi on six spiderlike legs. It reached out one massive, four-fingered hand to where Sparkman lay prone on the floor, but the Navi vanished in a flurry of pixels.

"A Dream Virus," Arrow said quietly. "Wonderful."

Its target gone, the bug-like monster turned its head to see more prey. The thick legs carried the Dream Virus's huge body impossibly fast; in moments, its hands were grabbing at Turboman and Roll, who were both hard-pressed to dodge.

"Battlechip: Meteor! Slot-in!" called Black. A few of the burning rocks went uncomfortably close to the attacked pair as they smashed into the Dream Virus, but it was enough to distract it and allow Roll and Turboman to get away. "Now, Yumi!"

"Gotcha. Fighter Sword, slot-in!" A huge sword appeared on Arrow's arm. While the Dream Virus was still recovering, she slashed at its arms. The attacks cut deeply, but they weren't enough to sever the green claws. The massive virus shot out another white beam. As Arrow danced away from the attack, the group noticed that a shimmering, transparent bubble had appeared around it while it was attacking.

Black smirked. "An Aura, huh? Well, if this guy isn't messing around, neither will I. Senshahou, slot-in!" Punk took aim, but the Dream Virus summoned Dream Bits and sent them scurrying toward him. Turboman and Arrow were quick to send attacks at them, turning their attention away from Punk and allowing him to fire.

Meiru was more than happy to use the opportunity. "Battlechip: Yo-yo, slot-in!" Like Arrow, Roll aimed at the thick arms, sending a spiked yo-yo into one of the gashes the other Navi had made. By the time the red projectile had returned to Roll, the Dream Virus's left arm was hanging by a thread of red flesh. Roll paid for the attack when the massive virus shot another laser at her, slamming into her legs when she tried to dodge. The nearly-severed arm gave way when she fired a Roll Arrow, splitting into a three-by-three cube and vanishing from sight. A cry distracted her next; she quickly got to her feet and deleted the Dream Bit that had just fired on Turboman.

"Vulcan, slot-in!" Yumi called. Arrow got to work on the right arm, but the Aura reappeared mid-attack. The small bullets of the gun were useless against it, and the Dream Virus fired another laser to make matters worse. Unable to dodge quickly enough with the Vulcan still firing, the archer was sent sprawling by the hit. Black's next Battlechip, an Earthquake, took out the Aura once again, but the massive monster didn't seem to pay much attention to that. Instead, the Dream Virus rounded on Turboman, who sent a Turbo Wheel attack at one of the behemoth's legs in hope of causing it to stumble. All that action did was anger it. It shot a massive laser at the red Navi.

Quickly, Kaita cried, "Stone Cube, slot-in!" Turboman could feel the heat radiating through the rock. He peered to the side in order to see what was going on; Arrow and Roll were darting around the Dream Virus' still-working right arm, slashing and firing at it whenever they had the chance. Even while the Dream Virus tried to fend them off, the space behind the Stone Cube grew hotter and hotter as the light ray pounded on the gray brick. Turboman silently urged it to hold out, trying to ignore the sinking feeling that he would end up as a lump of scrambled data against the back wall...

And then the beam abruptly stopped as Roll and Arrow's twin Mega Cannons cut through the Dream Virus's remaining arm. A hand clamped down on Turboman's spoiler to roughly yank him off the ground and toss him out of the way. Moments later, Black called, "Suikomi, slot-in!" and a large, gray box fan appeared in front of Punk, sending the Stone Cube flying toward the leg that Turboman had attacked earlier. The monster's leg was torn off by the force of the rock, and it crashed sideways to the ground. Its torn-off arms jerked a few times, never going completely still. The Navis remained wary, not believing that the Dream Virus had truly exhausted its energy. Their caution was not unfounded. The jerking stumps suddenly stilled to grow deep green and more elongated, sprouting two hands that reminded Turboman of pictures he'd seen of Venus flytraps: one hand's claws on top, one reversed to face downward, waiting to crush whatever it could catch in a deadly handclap. The changes didn't stop with the arms. Every spike on its body brightened to a gleaming white and grew larger as well, the rest of its body deepening to a darker green. Now transformed, it released a massive wave of energy that struck every Navi in front of it. It went on to send a more concentrated blast into Roll; she skidded back along the ground until the top of her helmet was millimeters away from the far wall, not moving once she'd come to a halt.

"We have to stop it right now, Turboman," Kaita said determinedly, fishing out three Battlechips.

Next to his window, Black agreed, "No shit, kiddo." Kaita gave him a look, but he only grinned in response. "Variable Sword, slot in!" Punk's hand grew a yellow sword with a huge, sharp-looking point.

As her Navi jumped over the Dream Virus's hand, missing the lethal clamp shut by seconds, Yumi called, "Stay close, Arrow-we'll use a Program Advance!"

Kaita felt more confident after hearing that-if his attempt failed, then there would still be at least some damage. He felt only more ready to try as Roll ran over to join the other three, and Meiru called, "Spreader! Triple slot-in!"

The Dream Virus was intent on deleting Arrow, her Lightspeed Arrows barely denting the monster's armor. The double-handed arm came screaming at her. It only managed to clip her on the side, but that was still enough to send her crashing into the bookcases. She looked up to see the massive beast lumbering toward her, but Roll fired on it just as it was about to deliver the final blow. It staggered to the side, and Yumi saw her chance to call, "Sword! Wide Sword! Long Sword!" Arrow wasted no time in slamming the thick blade into the ground, creating a shockwave that sent the virus reeling. Its next retaliation was not directed at either Navi but at Punk, who was sending Sonic Booms into the red crystal-seconds later, the shattered red crystal-on the monster's body.

Turboman saw Punk fly past him and swallowed; he was next in the Dream Virus's sights. "Let's see if this works, Kaita!"

"Right! Cannon! Triple slot-in!" The first two Cannons seemed normal enough to Turboman; then, Kaita sent the third in, and a new, powerful feeling swept through his body, stopping to fill his arms with sheer, dizzying power. Following the others' example, he brought the two Cannons together, willing it to work; he felt it shimmer and focus into a larger weapon, but it was wavering, just waiting to slip away. He knew that he couldn't waste time. Quickly, he brought the still-glowing Program Advance down to fire on the Dream Virus.

"Giga Cannon!" His wasn't nearly as impressive as Roll's-the beam only lasted for a fraction of a second, while the pink-clad Navi's Hyper Burst was still shooting out crackling, blue energy. Still, it was enough. The virus was surrounded by a massive version of the cube that normally signaled the deletion of smaller viruses before it finally vanished from sight.

The Navis looked out at the blank floor before them for a moment. Then, Punk asked, "We done here, Black?"

"You bet." That was enough for Yumi, evidently; Arrow disappeared in the standard block of text spelling 'PLUGOUT', and her Operator's window vanished soon after. He turned his attention to Meiru and Kaita. "Don't worry, Meiru-chan," he said warmly. "I'll take the time to beat you when we meet again. And you know what I look forward to the most?" There was suddenly steel in his voice, but the smile on his face never slipped. "You. Crying like the pathetic little girl you are."

"Think again." Any relief visible on Meiru's face was eclipsed by a scowl. "Just wait until you try-maybe I _will_ be crying, because I'll feel sorry for you winding up with a prison sentence!"

"Aww, they can't get me for _that_ much, can they? No, wait... maybe by then, they can. Who knows." He shrugged. "Does it matter? You'll never catch me, _Meiru-chan_. I can promise you that." Punk plugged out, and with one farewell, "Until next time," he was gone as well.

"Good riddance!" Roll shouted at the closing window. She turned to Turboman. "Well, I'm impressed," she said brightly. "That was the best first try at a Program Advance that I've ever seen!"

"I didn't think it was that good..." Turboman said sheepishly.

"Most Netbattlers can't even manage to get it to hold together, much less fire it," she explained.

Meiru nodded. "Give it a little practice, and you two'll be pretty good! I'm going to link Roll over to the Ministry of Science. Kaita, how does letting Turboman hitch a ride sound? They'll be able to repair the damage he's taken from this mess."

Kaita only had to look at Turboman, who appeared ready to fall over where he stood from exhaustion, to gratefully say, "That would be great." Roll took the other Navi's hand; the WWW Area vanished around them moments later, replaced by the normal blue of a warp tunnel through the Internet.

At the tunnel's end was a large homepage that was equipped with many different machines and data files; over the newly-appeared duo's heads floated a familiar Navi.

"Ring!" She looked much better than Turboman had expected her to; still, her normal cheer couldn't be found on her paler-than-normal features. A large window opened up to show Mary and a brown-haired scientist who wore glasses.

"Hikari-hakase, we've got the original cure program," Roll said, the white sphere materializing above her outstretched hand.

"Good, good!" the scientist said, while behind him Mary looked at Turboman and Kaita with surprise. "Now, I think I should be able to send it through the whole network if I do this..." He typed in a string of commands, and the sphere burst open, sending bright sparkles of light in all directions. As they faded away, Ring stirred. She floated back to the ground, eyes soon wide open and taking in Turboman and Roll.

"Nngh... wow, Turboman, you look horrible," she greeted. "What happened there, anyway?"

"A virus that transmitted through the air," Hikari-hakase explained. "It infected every Navi in Internet City at the time, but it's harmless now."

"Ring, I'm really sorry about this," Turboman began, but she cut him off.

"You? Do this? I don't think so, so don't even try to say sorry." Whatever seriousness she'd had fell away after that. "So, how did you get all roughed up like that?" she asked eagerly. "Tell me everything!"

"I think he should rest first," Mary said, prompting a sigh out of Ring.

"Okay, okay," she said reluctantly. "But wait, there's still Kaita!" Rounding on the window displaying him yawning, she demanded, "You tell me!"

"Kaita-kun's been up all night, too, and it _is_ almost sunrise." Meiru laughed, "I think you'll have to wait until tomorrow to get anything out of either of them!"

"Aw, man..."


	12. Our World, Forever Changing

Days after what the press was calling the 'Plague Virus Incident', Teruo and Sparkman were proving their lack of Netbattling skills once again.

"Aw, geez! Sparkman, retreat!"

Sparkman materialized back in Teruo's PET just as a beam of light tore into the spot he'd previously occupied. "We don't have to report this, do we, Teruo-san?" he whined. "We made a total mess of it, and I'm tired!"

Teruo himself was looking forward to it even less than his Navi. "You know how picky Black and Yumi are," he grumbled, beaming Sparkman into his computer. "Black's usually at his computer right now, isn't he? Go see if he wants his stupid files."

"I'm going, I'm going..." And with that, he was gone. Teruo settled back to wait for Sparkman to return. It took an unusually short amount of time before the Navi rematerialized, his eyes as wide as if every virus in the Internet was after him. "Teruo-san, Teruo-san!"

"Huh? Sparkman, what's the problem?" asked the Operator, sitting back up to look at his screen.

Panicked, he babbled, "I-we have to tell the Net Police. Black's programming something huge-that's why he needed those codes and documents, to figure out how to power it-it'll destroy everything if he finishes-"

"Whoa, hold on!" exclaimed Teruo, surprised at the news. "Like... a virus?" Sparkman nodded the affirmative, and the boy muttered, "That's kinda scary, if you ask me... Maybe you're right. Just what is this thing?"

Sparkman took a moment to calm himself before he informed his Operator, "It was the biggest-the most powerful thing I've-"

It was the last thing he'd ever say. Teruo gaped at his Navi, now minus one symbol and whatever data had been behind it. Sparkman himself could only stare in shock at what was sticking out of his chest; it had plowed through him so quickly, he hadn't even noticed it until it had broken through.

Punk wrenched his left arm out of Sparkman's body, jerking his victim backwards with it. For someone who'd just skewered another Navi, he looked incredibly calm as he examined the fluttering scraps of data stuck on his spikes, watching them fade away before looking up to address Teruo. "What did Black say when ya first met? Wasn't it something like, I dunno... 'No talking'?" Sparkman's motionless form morphed into the word 'DELETE' as Punk waved to the horrified Teruo. "See ya-if ya ever get out of juvie, anyway." Sparkman's body darkened and seemed to trickle away from the bottom up as his attacker was plugged out. The black-haired boy was about to say something when a loud, heavy thud interrupted his thoughts. He made it to the front door just as the policemen outside broke it down and surrounded him.

"What-why are you here?" One of the policemen restrained him while another clamped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists, ignoring his protests of, "Hey, let go of me! I'm gonna get my dad here, and he'll sue the pants off you for this! Stop it!" By the time he'd run out of things to say, Teruo was sitting in the back seat of the sheriff's car, the engine had started, and he was on his way to the police station.

* * *

"Excellent work," Black said, watching through the Joumon family's own surveillance cameras as the police escorted Teruo out of his own house. "Plug out, Punk."

"I'm assuming that ya haven't picked up any other annoying kids?" Punk asked as he materialized in Black's wrist-mounted PET.

"You assume correctly. That was the last one, fortunately." He went on to melodramatically declare, "I apologize to my mother, wherever she may be, if I was that annoying when I was a kid."

"I sure can't see the Kaita or Teruo in ya, if it makes ya feel any better," said Punk. Though his voice sounded about as reassuring as it usually did (not very), Black appreciated the sentiment.

"I'm touched." The PET pinged, and Punk displayed the incoming e-mail for his Operator. "The boss? Now?"

Punk speculated, "Might be about the World Three Area."

"Oh, boy." Reluctantly, Black rose to his feet and started the short journey to his employer's office. "I definitely put my foot in my mouth with that one."

"Didn't get enough before the brats came, eh?" Wearily, Black nodded. "Yikes. Good luck with this one."

Black knew that there was no use getting angry with Punk-what could he do to help? Still, he couldn't help a sarcastic, "Gee, thanks," as he pushed open the door.

The boss's office was dark, its main source of light a huge screen that covered the top third of the room. Below was a desk, and in front of it was a black chair. It faced away from visitors to the office, its eight feet decorated in multicolored fiber-optic lights. Non-changing ones rimmed it, and waves of them went up and down it in no particular pattern, constantly brightening and darkening with different colors. Black normally had little use for such pointless and expensive flashiness, but a job was a job.

"Good news first," he said before his employer could begin. "Sparkman's been deleted."

"Really?" asked the boss. His voice almost sounded asexual, but Black knew better. It sounded very pleased, and that was what really mattered. "You did it, didn't you? I can almost forgive you for that." 'Almost forgiveness' was the most Black had ever heard the boss give anyone. He supposed that he should be honored. "More importantly, just _how_ long will you be working on this now?"

Black winced in preparation. This would not please the man behind the chair at all. "If I'm uninterrupted, I'll be finished in six months."

"And if you aren't?"

He let out a breath. As far as boss blow-ups went, it wasn't turning out to be a bad one-but it was snowballing fast, and there was little he could do to save it other than lying. Which, of course, the boss would pick up on instantly. "Who knows?" he finally said, completely honest. "Maybe in eight months, maybe this time next year." That didn't bode well for Black and his project at all, and he knew it. "I can only offer my utmost apologies, sir. I'll do what I can to remedy the problems with the current prototype as soon as possible."

His leader listened, an expression of distaste forming on his face. "How many times must I tell you? I am not a drill sergeant, so please don't call me 'sir'." He shuddered at the title. "Anything but that." Anticipating Black's next few sentences, he continued, "I also appreciate your wish to keep me pleased, and I would hope-and understand-that you try not to cause me any type of discomfort. But I find actions to carry greater meaning than words."

"...I will begin work immediately," said Black after a moment, an unreadable expression on his face. "It _will_ be completed, don't worry."

The boss smiled, an almost childish excitement in his laughter. "That's good, then." He typed something into the display, remarking, "I might not have been so honorable to our annoying friends, but I trust your word, at least. Don't prove me wrong."

"I'll do what I can not to, boss," Black replied tonelessly.

A crystal wineglass sat on the desk, filled with red liquid. The boss picked it up to take a sip before continuing, "By the way, I've recruited some additional backup. He claims that you two have met." The blue-haired man in the corner only had to take a single step into the light before Black grinned.

"Atsuki!"

"Pleasure doin' business with you, man," laughed the blue-haired man as they exchanged a firm handshake. In a slightly more polite tone, he called, "Thank you for your time. We'll be leaving now." In an undertone, he asked Black, "Things running smoothly?"

Black's brown eye narrowed in irritation as they left the boss's office behind. "Overcautious geezer," he muttered, scowling. "I can handle something this simple."

"I've heard a lot of ways to describe him, but 'geezer'? Boy, if he were here to hear you say that..." Atsuki laughed. Black didn't. "I heard you screwed up. Badly. He said to tell you not to let it happen again-Nova has a reputation to build, after all. And you're also gonna have me making sure of that."

Black sighed, his eye remaining shut for a few seconds longer. "It was to speed up the main project. It wasn't that important, it just means that we'll be following schedule instead of finishing early. I thought it was obvious that it didn't matter." He looked up at the taller man. "Not that I mind you sticking around."

"Of course not," Atsuki replied. "So, where do I stay?"

* * *

Inside the office, the chair's owner traced a detail on his wineglass with a finger, letting himself be lost in one of his daydreams. Daydreams that would become reality in time, he was sure. He knew that Black and Atsuki weren't true believers in his vision, but it gave him little concern. They would get their deserved punishment when this was over. They, too, would be crushed underfoot when his final plan came into action. All the liars in the world, all the ones who hurt and scorned because they were 'better'... Soon, they would be dying hundreds at a time, leaving the oppressed, righteous few...

In the end, there would be no more suffering.

* * *

**A/N**: Well, here we are at the end of part one! Thanks to the seven or eight (it seems to fluctuate) people who have followed this through to the end, and an extra-special thanks to RandyPandy, Vio, and a mysterious Guest for leaving reviews! I realize that since Kaita and Mary aren't familiar to most people, not many readers are going to stop and read through, much less review, so it means a lot to me that you guys took the time to leave reviews. As you guys eventually saw, Rockman is alive and well, but I don't know about Netto... See you soon as we head for Kaita and Mary's next stop, and the next fic in the sequence: Grand Championship!


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